response to an article in the school paper

I"m thinking about sending this in to the sojourn, any thoughts you have would be nice ...


I like America. I like the Church. I like the American Church. There, I’ve said it. I am stepping out of the closet and saying that I appreciate Christianity in its current form in America. I realize this is not the chic position to take, and I realize this makes me less “post-modern” and therefore less “relevant” to society, but I am “emerging” with my point nonetheless.

I have become tired hearing how horrid the church in America is. I have become weary of everyone feeling as if they are the next prophet, spewing woes to the American church. “Woe to you American church,” they say, “You have money and are lazy. You cannot preach a Gospel of Joy or one of blessings from God. God wants us to be persecuted and miserable.”

Joel Osteen has become the most recent target. Your Best Life Now has sold a ridiculous amount of books on the concept that God wants you to be joyful and happy right now. And Christians go bezerk? Never mind the Wesleyan position has traditionally been that God does want you to have his best for you now. Never mind that Jesus wanted to bring the Kingdom of Heaven to Earth. “Nah,” would be the response “not like it is here in Babylon a.k.a. America.”

Don’t get me wrong; I realize the church has flaws. It is made of people, and people are fallen. However, whether we want to admit it or not, the church is the body of Christ. America church included. Unless, (in the words of the illustrious Dr. Keith Drury) we want a beheaded Jesus, we need to work within that church.

We have romanticized this concept of persecution here in America. We talk as if that is the only way to form “true Christians.” We hold up signs saying, “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.” This may or may not be true; either way we must fertilized the ground live bodies spreading The Gospel. Without a “state church” we would not have the bible in the form we have it. Whether we want to admit it or not, history is written by the winners, and if a successful church was never in place, I am not sure we would have Christianity at all. (I know God would have found a way, but to play the God card here means you have to say he can do it however he wants, and who are we to say it has to use persecution and not success.)

I do not have all the answers, I am aware of that. In addition, you may feel that I, as a person going into ministry here in America, am much like a turkey voting against thanksgiving. You are probably correct. Nevertheless, I am sick of watching Christians shoot at other Christian’s who are doing their best to bring as many to Jesus as possible. We are all fighting the same battle; let’s focus on the enemy and not on each other.

Praise God

I have found that my writing here has moments of. . negativity. . please hold the laughs. Consequently, I felt as if I should write something that is a bit more uplifting.

Dr. Kline is the associate pastor at my church. He has been my mentor for the past 6 or 7 years, and was actually the pastor who dedicated me as a baby. Other than my father, he is the man I want to be most like when I “grow up” and I am looking forward to working on staff with him at some point. If I were starting a church, he would be my first choice for a pastor of evangelism and Christian Ed.

However, he is not the only person involved in this story. His daughter (who has been sick for some time now) went into a coma and with the levels in her body, and no one was expecting her to wake-up. Sunday morning while I was in Indonesia, the church had a special prayer for her around the alter, and after service Dr. Kline made his way to Columbus to say what he thought would be his final goodbye. On his way, Dr. Kline received a phone call. His daughter had woken up, and not only that but all of the levels that had previously been out of whack, no longer were.

Four of the six doctors immediately said this was “intervention.” One of them was a strong Christian and had no problem pointing to God for the answer to “how could this happen.” Two of the doctors are still trying to figure out what happened.

PRAISE GOD!

Throughout my life, I have been hesitant to use the word “miracle.” It’s not that I haven’t seen some (I have), nor is it that I haven’t experienced any (again I have, however I don’t want to feel as if everything that happens is some unexplainable, unrepeatable feat of the supernatural. I have always been a bit afraid of having an experiential faith, which was good with the good, and low with the bad.

However, when I look at moments like these I realize that God is there, and although he does not always dip his hand in to fix things … there are moments like these that he does. To remind me how great and awesome he truly is.

State church or Persucuted church?

I have read a lot about the church and state stuff, so I thought I'd post the paper that I wrote. I don't completely agree with this, but we had to fall off the log. . . .responses are welcome.


If the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church, then the state church is the fertilizer, which allows it to grow. Cheesy? Yes, but I think this statement is still lined with truth. It is easy to say that the persecution of the church has allowed the church to grow, but I do not believe that we would be able to say that if it weren’t for the times Christianity was in control. History is taught and written by the winners, and the history of Christianity is no different. If the state church had never been established then we would not be where we are today.
I will agree that when the church is under persecution it is at its “strongest” spiritually. It is during this persecution that the proverbial “diamonds in the rough” are created through pressure and outside forces. In these times, common men can become spiritual giants by withstanding pain, and not denying Christ. Although The Gospel is not spread as much, therefore not as many are converted, those that stay fast become much stronger and deeper Christians. Nonetheless, it is not our job to judge the sincerity of a conversion, but to continue to spread the word of God to all.

In addition, it can be pointed out that a state religion leads to shallow and complacent Christians, who are more concerned with “conversion rates” than with the authenticity of the conversions themselves. When the state controls the religion, it becomes just that: a religion. Christianity prides itself in being not a religion but a relationship, and one will be hard-pressed to find said relationship with the bounds of a state controlled “faith”.

Nevertheless, I would have to say that while a persecuted Church sets up a very strong foundation for us to build from it cannot hold up the structure itself for it has no power to do so. We talk about being “World Changers” and trying to transform our community, still it is difficult at best to change a world that is constantly trying to kill you.

Persecution has been somewhat romanticized in the American church because we have not felt it, and therefore do not understand it. We have become complacent within our own structure; and seemingly long for something to stir up within us a passion. Many say that true fervency and passion cannot be upheld within the confines of a state ordained religion. One look at Muslim countries would quickly squelch this argument however. Muslims seem to be more radical and sold out than most Christians that I know, and most are practicing within a state ordained religion.

If we look back throughout history, I think we will see that the church had its largest growth following times when Christianity was the religion of the state. Without the state, the scriptures would have been more destroyed and quite possibly we would not have preserved the ones we have. The Gospel would not have spread as far as it has today if the church would have constantly been under persecution.The seeds may have been laid, but they would not have grown in that rocky soil, nor on the open road where birds would eat them up. It is only on ground that has been cultivated and set apart for the purpose of growing that the grain will produce true harvest.