Starting from the Ground Up

It actually got cold in my room last night. I was actually cold. The temperature dropped and it seems as if it just won't stop raining, which is kind of nice. We found a leaky pipe in my closet a few days ago (it's been leaking for some time), so my entire apartment has been a pleasant atmosphere of mold as of late. So, it's nice to have an excuse to keep the windows open. The only drawback, it's hard to go for a walk, or a bike ride, or anything else in the rain. So instead, I sit at my computer, in my moldy apartment, and type away.

I recently picked up a book by Anne Lamott, called "Grace (Eventually): Thoughts on Faith." She's a decent writer, I'll admit, but I can't get through the second chapter without her trashing either a)George Bush (not just trash, but spew utter hatred at) or b)the Church. And I'm tired of it. So I put the book down, and I'm not sure what I'm going to do with it. Maybe I should just get some cool square black glasses and start drinking coffee and Guiness and start writing my blog in some west coast coffee shop in a passive-aggressive tolerance that will blow your mind and make you want to be just like me. Maybe not.

It seems to me that you can have an agenda, search the Bible over, and come up with your own ground-breaking explanantion of why God really wrote Scripture in the first place. I don't think that's a good way to read the Bible. I'm guilty of it myself. I don't claim that conservative Republican values line up with Scripture. There's a good bit of Scripture that doesn't support their ideas. The liberal Democrat will have a fun time stringing together passages that make it seem like the greatest commandment is tolerance toward one another in acceptance and without accountability. Because the bottom line is personal freedom, right? I've been reading another book, and I've not finished it just yet, but it's pretty good, so far. A little watered down, sure, but overall pretty solid. "Crazy Love" by Francis Chan is a pretty good alternative to the situation in the American church. The Emergent/emerging church really bashes the church and bashes Christians. Ephesians 4:1-4 tells us to be tolerant of one another in love. I think Paul is talking to the church in Ephesus here. Often when we're talking about "one another" we're talking about the Church. "Love your enemy" certainly applies to non-Christians, but we are told over and over again to love the Church. Instead of blaming and shaming our brothers and sisters, maybe we should just do what Scripture tells us. Chan is not perfect by any means, but I think he's got some ideas that go in the right direction. And it's not really new ideas, either. It's simply starting from the ground up, except that ground is going to be Scripture. It's not coming to Scripture with ideas of trying to bash homosexuals or social justice or free capitalism or socialism or whatever. It's reading the Scripture for what it says, and then going from there. The farther we get away from Scripture, the more our own agendas and opinions are going to get in the way of what's really best for us. We have a vast population of different people, and if we try to approach things from opinions and topics and biases, it might make a fun coffee shop discussion. But to move forward and to grow, I think we are going to need to bring it back to Scripture. It's not enough to get caught up in the culture and to try to discern God speaking through that, because He will speak through situations and people and even culture. It's hard to tell though, sometimes, which voice is God and which voice is not. The Bible helps us to hear, helps us to discern. You'd think God's voice would be the big booming one, glaring at us from every aspect of society. But sometimes, as the Bible, tells us, God comes in a whisper, and it can be so hard to hear. Because God is not shoving us into society (at least, I don't think that's what Jesus was praying for His disciples), He's calling us to Him. It seems to me that He whispers so we have to listen really hard and that we have to draw closer so we can hear Him better. Those are just my thoughts, though. It's back to Scripture I go. And since I've been rambling and nay-saying about people giving their opinions without Scripture, I probably should quote something:

"As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to one hope when you were called—one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. " (Eph. 4:1-6, NIV)