Julian of Norwich was born around 1342.  Very little is known of her life.  Apparently she became gravely ill at age thirty and expected to die. Seven days later the illness passed and she experienced sixteen visions, or revelations. These visions led her to meditate on the death of Jesus Christ. She became an “anchoress”, a recluse living alone in a hut near the church in Norwich, England.

She devoted her life to prayer and contemplation. Her writings became the book Revelations of Divine Love, a spiritual classic. This was the first book written in English by a woman.  Though she lived in solitude, she did gather a reputation as a counselor during her life as many sought her out to speak with her (Source for Julian’s bio found here).

Over the past year  I have been reading some of the classics of Christian spirituality . It has been a challenging experience as their works require a different kind of reading then I usually engage in.  They need to be read slowly and meditatively. There is a spiritual depth in them that cannot be sped through. In this I have been convicted: there are so many books I desire to read that I often am tempted to plow through them, getting the gist of what is going on, before moving to the next one. The mystics cannot be approached in this way (very few books should be approached like this, on that note).

Upon finishing Revelations of Divine Love I went back and looked at my highlights. Surprisingly, since I did not think I highlighted that much, there were nearly sixty passages with highlights!

One theme that comes through in Julian is trust in God’s love and strength. God is all we need, and in this quote the entire universe is portrayed as a mere nut in God’s hand:

 I saw that He is to us everything that is good and comfortable for us: He is our clothing that for love wrappeth us, claspeth us, and all encloseth us for tender love, that He may never leave us; being to us all-thing that is good, as to mine understanding. Also in this He shewed me a little thing, the quantity of an hazel-nut, in the palm of my hand; and it was as round as a ball. I looked thereupon with eye of my understanding, and thought: What may this be? And it was answered generally thus: It is all that is made. I marvelled how it might last, for methought it might suddenly have fallen to naught for little[ness]. And I was answered in my understanding: It lasteth, and ever shall [last] for that God loveth it. And so All-thing hath the Being by the love of God. In this Little Thing I saw three properties. The first is that God made it, the second is that God loveth it, the third, that God keepeth it.

This love of God is clearly seen in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus that saves us, restoring us to our Creator.

The precious plenty of His dearworthy blood descended down into Hell and burst her bands and delivered all that were there which belonged to the Court of Heaven. The precious plenty of His dearworthy blood overfloweth all Earth, and is ready to wash all creatures of sin, which be of goodwill, have been, and shall be. The precious plenty of His dearworthy blood ascended up into Heaven to the blessed body of our Lord Jesus Christ, and there is in Him, bleeding and praying for us to the Father,–and is, and shall be as long as it needeth;–and ever shall be as long as it needeth. And evermore it floweth in all Heavens enjoying the salvation of all mankind, that are there, and shall be…

There is a good deal more in Julian worth reflecting on, which I will get to in another post.  What Julian is most known for is the phrase “All shall be well”.  In a moment of doubt, she clung to the fact that one day all things shall be well.

That itself is a good reminder for us in the midst of our lives.

I am quite disillusioned with politics.  Too many powerful religious people think it is their job to pledge support to a presidential candidate.  I wonder how Jesus feels when his people are reduced to a voting bloc?  Recently a large group of evangelical Christians gathered together to decide which candidate to throw their support behind.  There have been a few blog posts about this recently, showing the problems inherent in it, which I urge you to check out: Timothy Dalyrmple calls it a travesty and David Neff calls it dangerous.

Anyway, in this I think there is a misconception that real change comes through how you vote in a presidential election.

Don’t get me wrong, I do not think Christians should sit on the sidelines.  I think our interaction with the powers of government should be wiser than simply voting once every four years.  There is much more we can do and I think it starts at the local level.

(Much of what comes next is a summary from the Polaris Project website, but the page I got it from has been taken down*)

There is legislation proposed in Pennsylvania (House Bill 235  by Representative Clymer; State Bill 338 by Senator Leach) that would require placement of the National Human Trafficking Research Center Hotline number in key establishments, including places of transit (truck stops, welcome centers and bus stations) and in venues where victims may be found “at work” (such as hotels/motels, strip clubs, massage parlors).  The hotline provides callers – victims, tipsters, community members – with a bridge to help by linking callers with one or more of over 3000 resources across the country.  Placing this hotline in key locations is critical to fighting human trafficking.  Texas was the first state to require the posting of the hotline in public locations.  Since that time Texas has consistently been the highest in call volume to the hotline, resulting in rescued victims and a greater awareness of crime throughout the state.

Requiring that this hotline be posted would cost the state of PA absolutely NOTHING as the businesses would have to print it themselves.  Further, it may generate money for the state in fines to businesses that do not post it.

My hope would be that churches take time to encourage members to call on political leaders to pass this legislation.  Perhaps this could happen as a unified effort by small groups in the church, or by the effort of individuals.  Either way, what I am asking only takes a few minutes..

Calling on those in power to create just laws has a long tradition among the people of God…just read the Old Testament prophets such as Amos.

Here is what you can do:

1. Determine who your STATE senator and STATE representative is by going to www.legis.state.pa.us.  I live in Wyomissing so mine are Mark Gillen (http://www.legis.state.pa.us/cfdocs/legis/home/member_information/house_bio.cfm?id=1209) and Mike Folmer http://www.legis.state.pa.us/cfdocs/legis/home/member_information/senate_bio.cfm?id=1080)

2. Then place a quick call to your senator and representative, urging them to take action NOW to help victims of human trafficking.  Urge them to support and cosponsor the bipartisan bill by Senators Leach and Vance to post the Human Trafficking Hotline bill.  Here is an example of what you can say: “Hi, my name is ____ and I am the representatives constituent. I am calling to urge the representative to cosponsor and support HB 235, legislation that will help victims of human trafficking right now in PA by requiring the National Human Trafficking Hotline in certain establishments. Will the representative support this legislation?“

2b.  Or you can email them.

3. Call Senator Pileggi, Majority Leader of the Senate (717-787-4712) and Senator Corman, Appropriations Committee Chair in Leadership (717-787-1377). These senators have complete power over whether a bill goes to the senate floor for a vote.  When you call, ask the senator to bring SB 338 to the Senate floor for vote as soon as possible.

We are privileged to live in a country that cares about justice (or at least claims to).  Perhaps in a different situation our interaction with the powers that be would be slightly different.  But in this situation, I think we need to be people who work for justice in all capacities.  This does not end with making a phone call or an email.  It goes on to influencing those around us so that more and more people do not look the other way when faced with injustice.  It continues with creating ways to help those rescued from trafficking.

It is all that and more.  But it is not less than calling on our leaders to do the right thing.

*The Hotline is run by the Polaris Project.  Until last week they had a whole page on their site with action (Most of what I wrote starting with the paragraph on the PA legislation was from their page) but that page has been taken down.  Either way, their website is very helpful.

Awesome.

This same student had purchased a Kindle Fire.  There is much discussion about the growing prevalence of e-books and how this is affecting book sellers and reading habits and so on.  In my own non-scientific study, one tremendous benefit of e-books is the introduction of the classics to people who may have never read them.  I have enjoyed downloading free books by the likes of Dostoyevsky, Dickens and Austen.  My sister and two of my students have also used their Kindles to get into old books.

One of those students plans to join me in reading Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace in 2012.  She may not start it for a while as she is now swamped with assigned reading.

I plan to start it soon.  For me, 2011 was a Dostoyevsky year and 2012 may be a Tolstoy year.  First I read Crime and Punishment.  Second was Notes from the Underground, a weird book in which the first half is a rant on the pointlessness of life and the second half is a tale of this underground man’s foray into society.  Third was a re-read of The Brothers Karamazov which, upon my second go-through, became my favorite book of all time (sorry John Irving’s A Prayer for Owen Meany).

I plan to read more Dostoyevsky in the future.  But I want to move on to the other great Russian novelist, Leo Tolstoy.  So far the only Tolstoy I have read is his treatise on nonviolence, The Kingdom of God is Within You. War and Peace is on my Kindle and ready to start…though I am intimidated as it is about the longest book ever.

I have read about how these two novelists present different views of God and humanity.  Dostoyevsky’s books are certainly dark with violent crimes and people suffering from their own psychological punishments.  At any rate, I noticed this article today, “God who Writes Like Dostoyevsky“.  It has me really chomping at the bit to get into Tolstoy and then maybe back into some Dostoyevsky again.

1. Campus runs like a well-oiled machine – it is not like there are huge fields of uncut grass or piles of garbage laying on the sidewalk.  They employ people to care for campus.

2. Many needs students have are individual needs which will be met by other individuals.  In this it is important for the Christian students to be there with their friends for support.  This is one reason it is vitally important our CSF activities, such as Bible study, do not become a high-walled safe-haven for the Christians to retreat to.  They need to be out there among their peers, representing Christ.  That said, this will happen on a more individual level then on a large-group level.

3. When it comes to figuring out ways for CSF, as a group, to serve campus…maybe we are just not that creative!  So ideas are welcomed…

This past Tuesday we decided to perform a service we had done in the fall: pick up trash for Jesus.  In September we decided to walk up and down the hallways in the dorms, knocking on doors and asking if the residents would like us to take out their trash.  When asked why we were doing this, we simply said it was an act of love and kindness because that is the kind of thing we Christians do.

We did not get through all the dorms so I am sure we will be doing this again.  It is a fantastic way to meet people who may never even consider coming to a Bible study.

It is also a way to awkwardly meet the guy who answers the door in just a towel!

Nearly a century and a half ago, President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation — a document that reaffirmed the noble goals of equality and freedom for all that lie at the heart of what it means to live in America.

In the years since, we have tirelessly pursued the realization and protection of these essential principles. Yet, despite our successes, thousands of individuals living in the United States and still more abroad suffer in silence under the intolerable yoke of modern slavery.

During National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month, we stand with all those who are held in compelled service; we recognize the people, organizations and government entities that are working to combat human trafficking; and we recommit to bringing an end to this inexcusable human rights abuse.

Human trafficking endangers the lives of millions of people around the world, and it is a crime that knows no borders.

Trafficking networks operate both domestically and transnationally, and although abuses disproportionally affect women and girls, the victims of this ongoing global tragedy are men, women and children of all ages.

Here in Berks county the organization Freedom and Restoration for Everyone Enslaved (FREE) is working to mobilize citizens to become activists in ending human trafficking.  I have been taking part in FREE meetings for over a year and the more I learn the more I want to do…and on some depressing days feel like there is very little I can do.  My role with FREE is to lead the group that seeks to educate and equip faith communities.

You can read my first monthly email to local faith communities here.

One thing we can do today to take action is to call for the release of Sara Kruzen.  Sara was raped at age 11 and then forced into prostitution by the man who raped her at age 13.  At age sixteen she fought back, killing the man who was her rapist and pimp.  Since then she has served 17 years in prison.  There is a movement to call on the governor of California to step in and release her.

Sara is not a criminal, instead she was the victim of repeated crimes who fought back in self defense.

Sadly, there are many like her out there who are used and abused every night.  Much of the rest of society sees them as “whores” and “hos” who chose that life.  The truth is they are victims who need our help.  The real criminals are the pimps and the men who buy these girls.

A young Oklahoma mother shot and killed an intruder to protect her 3-month-old baby on New Year’s Eve, less than a week after the baby’s father died of cancer.

Sarah McKinley says that a week earlier a man named Justin Martin dropped by on the day of her husband’s funeral, claiming that he was a neighbor who wanted to say hello. The 18-year-old Oklahoma City area woman did not let him into her home that day.

On New Year’s Eve Martin returned with another man, Dustin Stewart, and this time was armed with a 12-inch hunting knife. The two soon began trying to break into McKinley’s home.

As one of the men was going from door to door outside her home trying to gain entry, McKinley called 911 and grabbed her 12-gauge shotgun.

McKinley told ABC News Oklahoma City affiliate KOCO that she quickly got her 12 gauge, went into her bedroom and got a pistol, put the bottle in the baby’s mouth and called 911.

“I’ve got two guns in my hand — is it okay to shoot him if he comes in this door?” the young mother asked the 911 dispatcher. “I’m here by myself with my infant baby, can I please get a dispatcher out here immediately?”

The 911 dispatcher confirmed with McKinley that the doors to her home were locked as she asked again if it was okay to shoot the intruder if he were to come through her door.

“I can’t tell you that you can do that but you do what you have to do to protect your baby,” the dispatcher told her. McKinley was on the phone with 911 for a total of 21 minutes.

When Martin kicked in the door and came after her with the knife, the teen mom shot and killed the 24-year-old. Police are calling the shooting justified.

I think this woman was fully justified in killing the intruder.

One of the questions I wrestle with, that I think goes right to the heart of following Jesus, is when is violence ever justified?  Jesus won the greatest victory ever won by laying down his life on a cross.  He called his followers to take up their crosses and follow him.  Thus, if Jesus did not use violence to defend himself than there is no way we should either.

Further, Christians have faith that there will be a resurrection someday, that this life is not all there is, and that what looks like a defeat can turn into a victory. I am challenged as I read about the early Christians who were so sure that Jesus was Lord and Savior that they were willing to die for it.  They figured that if God did not save their lives that was okay, as they had a greater life in the future.  Again, if we too believe this then what reason can there be for self-defense?

That said, I think the teen mom in the story was completely justified in using violence to defend herself and her baby.

It seems clear to me that Christians are given the choice to lay down our lives or defend ourselves.  If I am threatened, I can use force to defend myself or I can choose not to.

But I don’t see any evidence that I can make this choice for others.  In other words, I can choose to lay down my life rather than use violence on others.  I cannot choose to lay down the life of my wife or daughter.  If I am walking down the street and see a child being abused, I cannot choose not to use force if necessary to save that child.

I think God may call us to allow ourselves to suffer, as Jesus suffered.  I don’t see evidence that we can allow others to suffer.  If anything, I believe we are required to ease the suffering of others.

(For the record, I think when we talk about Christian nonviolence we need to remember that one aspect of it is that justice will come on the perpetrator.  God is a God of justice.  Christian nonviolence has always held to the hope that God will one day  punish evil.  They just do not believe it is their role to be God’s instrument in that.)

Dietrich Bonhoeffer was one of the strongest German voices opposing the Nazis.  From the very beginning he saw their message as diametrically opposed to the message of the Gospel.  Eventually he saw the only option in opposing the Nazis to be joining the conspiracy to kill Hitler.

Eric Metaxas’ biography of Bonhoeffer is fantastic.  Metaxas goes into quite extensive detail, this book is at least twice as long as his biography of William Wilberforce.  I highly recommend this book, it may have been my favorite book all year.  It is a fascinating and encouraging story.  Metaxas provides some great quotes from Bonhoeffer, such as this from a sermon during Bonhoeffer’s 28th year:

There is no way to peace along the way of safety. For peace must be dared, it is itself the great venture and can never be safe. Peace is the opposite of security. To demand guarantees is to want to protect oneself. Peace means giving oneself completely to God’s commandment, wanting no security, but in faith and obedience laying the destiny of the nations in the hand of Almighty God, not trying to direct it for selfish purposes. Battles are won, not with weapons, but with God. They are won when the way leads to the cross” (p. 241)

Scot McKnight’s The King Jesus Gospel challenges many evangelical understandings of the Gospel.  McKnight argues that what we call “gospel” is actually the plan of salvation.  The plan of salvation is important, but it is not the gospel.  Most “gospels” rely on the apostle Paul, specifically the book of Romans.  But if the gospel = the plan of salvation then why are the four biographies of Jesus called “gospels” when they do not include the plan of salvation?  Likewise, if the gospel = justification by faith then Jesus must not have been preaching the gospel, as Jesus preached the coming of the kingdom of God but not justification by faith.  McKnight is clear that the plan of salvation, and justification by faith, are not wrong…they are simply not the gospel.  The gospel includes them, but is more than them.  This book is vitally important.

My wife and I watch very little television.  We pretty much watch whatever is available streaming on Netflix along with The Office and 30 Rock.  Actually, I just learned a few weeks ago that my wife does not really like The Office, she only watches it because I like it.  She is so loving!  But she cracks up watching 30 Rock.
Not only is 30 Rock pretty much the only television show we have in common, Tina Fey’s Bossypants is the only book we both read in 2011.  It is a fun, laugh out loud, book.  If you want an enjoyable, random read, pick it up.

One theme I harp on with the college students is calling.  Growing up I got the impression that God calls people (well, men) to be pastors and missionaries.  Being called into one of these fields was honorable, you had been set apart to do work in ministry.  If you were not called into one of these areas then you could do whatever work interested you and hopefully tell people you work with about Jesus.  But your work during the week was not really spiritual or holy.  It was just what you did to fill the time between church and church activities.

What I want my students to know is that this is the wrong way to look at work.  The truth is that God calls people into all sorts of work.  If you are not called to be a pastor or missionary you are not exempt from calling.  Your work done during the week is vitally important to the kingdom of God.

I’ve written about this before, here and here and here.

Two books I read this year illustrate this point.  First, Andy Crouch’s Culture Making: Recovering Our Creative Calling” (2008).  Crouch diagnoses four ways evangelical Christians have related to culture: condemn, critique, copy, consume. Although each of these may be appropriate for particular things and at particular times (condemning pornography, for example), as a way of relating to culture as a whole they are unsatisfying. Instead Christians should be creating and cultivating culture. Crouch grounds this in the Bible story, from creation on through Jesus Christ and into new creation.

Here is one good quote to illustrate what Crouch is saying:

Culture is what we make of the world. Culture is, first of all, the name for our relentless, restless human effort to take the world as it’s given to us and make something else.  This is the original insight of the writer of Genesis when he says that human beings were made in God’s image: just like the original Creator, we are creators. God, of course, began with nothing, whereas we begin with something. But the difference is not as great as you might think. For every act of creation involves bringing something into being that was not there before-every creation is ex nihilo, from nothing, even when it takes the world as its starting point. Something is added in every act of making. This is clearest in the realm of art, where the raw materials of pigment and canvas become more than you ever could have predicted. Even a five-year-old’s finger painting is more than the sum of paper and paint. But creation, the marvelous making of more than was there before, also happens when a chef makes an omelet, when a carpenter makes a chair, when a toddler makes a snow angel.  Culture is all of these things: paintings (whether finger paintings or the Sistine Chapel), omelets, chairs, snow angels. It is what human beings make of the world. It always bears the stamp of our creativity, our God-given desire to make something more than we were given (23)

Crouch argues that we change culture by creating more of it.  Too often evangelical Christians have been content to copy culture, so if there is a popular style of music soon there is a “Christian” version.  Crouch would argue that Christian musicians should be creating the new styles of music.  He also spends time talking about how Francis Schaeffer and his disciples were very good at critiquing films, but this ended up being a mere academic philosophizing.  They may critique art, but they do not create art themselves.  Crouch would argue that Christians should be creating good art rather than just critiquing art.

This book calls Christians in all fields to set about creating and cultivating culture.  In this we find vocation:

The religious or secular nature of our cultural creativity is simply the wrong question. The right question is whether, when we undertake the work we believe to be our vocation, we experience the joy and humility that come only when God multiplies our work so that it bears thirty, sixty and a hundredfold beyond what we could expect from our feeble inputs. Vocation-calling-becomes another word for a continual process of discernment (256)

In 2010 James Davison Hunter released a book titled To Change The World: The Irony, Possibility and Tragedy of Christianity in the Late Modern World.  Hunter demonstrates that while nearly every Christian institution seeks to “change the world” today, Christians have become largely irrelevant.  Why is this so?  The question becomes more intriguing when you realize that Christianity is still the dominant religion in America.  So if the majority hold to Christian beliefs, why does Christianity hold such little influence.

One of the main reasons, if not the main reason, Hunter diagnoses is that Christians have bought into the idea that the world is changed through politics.  The “Religious Right” seek to take American back to an idealized past.  Their method is to convert people individually, assuming that new beliefs will lead people to vote in new ways and thus to “change the world.”  Hunter shows how a growing “Religious Left”, while differing on what changing the world entails (as they focus on things like poverty, the environment, and war) also see the solution as political.  A third group, the “Neo-Anabaptists” may appear different as they find no hope in politics, but Hunter argues their identity is based on the state and political powers being corrupt, showing they too adhere to the idea that politics is where cultural change happens.

But converting more people to the correct belief system, assuming this will change how they vote and thus get more people with the right belief system into political power will not change the culture.

Hunter shows, historically, how cultural change occurs as the “elites” in a culture buy into an idea and this trickles down.  Change occurs from the top-down.  I don’t recall Hunter putting it this way, but the implication is that for change to occur we need Christians who are the best of the best at what they do, shaping and influencing culture in the highest spheres (one example he gives is that though the USA Today has a much large readership, the NY Times is much more influential in terms of influencing those in power).

In the end, this book is not a manifesto on how to change culture (which is why Hunter does not simply say the method to change culture is to get more Christians in elite positions).  Rather, the book is a challenge to Christians to be faithful in their calling, as individuals and on a local level, and beyond that to trust the Holy Spirit for the big change.  Or as Hunter says in an interview on Amazon: “A third thing that I would like for readers to take away is that there are alternative ways of thinking about the world we live in, and engaging it, that are constructive and draw upon resources within the Christian tradition. In the end, these strategies are not first and foremost about changing the world, but living toward the flourishing of others.”

Christians have approached culture with attitudes of “defensive against” (Christian Right), “relevance to” (Christian Left) and “purity from” (Neo-Anabaptist). Hunter offers a new way of engagement, which he calls “Faithful presence”.  Faithful presence sees Christians as fully present and committed in their spheres of social influence; it is a “constructive resistance that seeks new patterns of social organization that challenge, undermine, and otherwise diminish oppression, injustice, enmity, and corruption and, in turn, encourage harmony, fruitfulness and abundance, wholeness, beauty, joy, security and well-being (247).”

You could almost say Hunter deconstructs his own work, as early on he shows how cultures do change, but by the end he does not put forth a program based on that on how to change the culture.  Cultural change is not the point, faithful presence is.

Interestingly, Hunter offers a brief critique of Crouch’s book.  Crouch responds, saying that he and Hunter agree though Hunter does not appear to realize it.

Both these books are profound and thought-provoking.  There is much more in each than I could possibly speak on in a brief post.  Thus, I urge you to check them out.

Katniss Everdeen and Lisbeth Salander

Both of these powerful female characters star in extremely popular trilogies:  The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins and the final book in Stieg Larsson’s Millennium series, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest.  Being the father of a newborn baby girl, I wonder if I subconsciously am looking for books with strong female leads.  I doubt I should look too deeply into it, as both these book series have been on the bestseller list for months.

If you’re looking for exciting, engaging stories, check out either of these series.  They both also provide thought-provoking themes.  The Hunger Games confronts our entertainment driven society, in the process creating a story that combines two things we are obsessed with, war and reality television.  What is a world like where war becomes the reality tv?  The Millennium trilogy focuses on violence against women (the title of the first book in the original Swedish is Men Who Hate Women) in the forms of abuse, rape and human trafficking.

Dickens, Dostoyevskey, Austen and Tolkien

Thanks to the Kindle offering old books for free, I got into the classics this year.  Before I did that though, I reread The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings along with The Silmarillion which is a sort of “Old Testament” to the other stories.  Reading those stories got me fired up for The Hobbit, coming next year to the big screen.

As for other classics, some may say I should turn in my “man” card, but I have to say I enjoyed reading Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice.

When I was in 10th grade I was part of the cast for the fall play,  A Tale of Two Cities.  I have fond recollections of storming the Bastille.  Since then I always wanted to read the book, so I finally did this year.  The sacrifice of Sidney Carton is one of the most inspiring scenes in literature.  I also stuck with Dickens to read A Christmas Carol, which every person should read at least once in their life, preferably during the holiday season.

Finally, I left the British isles and moved over to Russia, reading Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment and then (rereading) The Brothers Karamazov.  Simply amazing.  The Brothers Karamazov may be my favorite novel of all time.    If you don’t want to tackle it, at least read the chapters “Rebellion” and “The Grand Inquisitor”.  In the first chapter Dostoyevsky, a Christian by the way, puts forth one of the strongest arguments against God’s existence.  This argument is from the lips of Ivan, the atheist in the story.  He presents it to his brother, the devout monk Aloysha.  Aloysha’s only answer is to bring up the suffering servant, Jesus Christ.  This leads into the next chapter, a story written by Ivan set in Sevilla, Spain during the Inquisition.  Jesus shows up and the Grand Inquisitor puts him on trial.  Basically, Jesus and his message get in the way of the work the Church is doing.  Ivan may have some respect for Jesus, but like many people he sees a Church that has strayed far from Jesus’ message.  It drives me to ask the question, and should drive all of us who work in ministry to ask, if Jesus showed up today, would he be in the way as we go about our church activities?

We both insisted our reading was right.

My sister and wife sided with me and we moved on.  Hours later I went online and discovered my brother-in-law was right (we also neglected to miss a later page in the directions that explicitly said he was right).

Once I knew he was correct, I was able to interpret the game directions in a new way.

In our debate, we both approached the text believing we were right.  We both read the text in a way that supported our conclusions.  Even though it turns out he was right, the text of the directions is poorly worded.  Either interpretation could be accepted (again, until you turn to a later page where it is more explicit).

It kind of reminds me how Christians fight over Scripture.  There are so many topics Christians disagree on.  We approach the text assuming we are right, welcoming the passages that clearly support our view and working hard to squeeze ones that appear not to into our theology.

In a previous post I dreamed about what the Christian community on campus at Penn State Berks could do.  I also dreamed of what the church could do.  At the risk of sounding overly pessimistic, I recognize the local church already does much of this.

Yet sadly there is much division.  Diversity is not necessarily a problem and some degree of plurality within the church should be expected (read John Franke’s book Manifold Witness where he excellently argues for this).  It seems that the real problem is that the Christian church cannot agree at which points diversity of opinion is okay and when diversity place someone outside of the Christian tradition.

(As a sidenote, and good food for thought, read Roger Olsen’s blog post on the the difference between being “Christian” and being “saved”).

Last week I was baking cookies for the college students who are moving on after this semester to new places.  While baking I was listening to the Freakonomics podcast “The Truth is Out There…Isn’t it?“.  The basic theme was that the more we learn about a subject, the more we desire to socialize with those who agree with us.  In other words, we learn to gather information that conforms to what we already believe.

We do not want to change our minds easily.

That said, I suppose we need to agree to disagree on many things in order to get down to the work we have been called to, bringing hope to a hopeless world.  I think the world looks on at some of the debates we are having and asks, “who cares?”

CSF at Penn State Berks spends a lot of time studying the Bible.  But if all we do is sit around as a circle of Christians and talk about what the Bible means, we are not helping anybody outside of our little “in-group”.

I guess the best I can ask is what is more important:

Two Christians arguing about who is “right” about every little detail?

Two Christians laying aside their differences to go minister to those in need on campus?