Well, yes, words have different connotations for different people. This is what makes poetry and poetic prose interesting, and what also makes it a bit different from confessional and legal documents. For people in tune with nature, the zebra, the wild lion, and the hippopotamus are wild, untamed. Untamed nature like the Rocky mountains, or the Rain Forest, is majestic, natural, directly God-created. While some lions and hippos and elephants have been tamed in spite of their size and strength, the contrast is with the independance and majesty of the untamed. Untamed means beyond our control, beyond our beck and call. The essence of our relationship with God is that we cannot lead God around on a leash. God is not tamed by us. But, it is not the only word that the song uses to describe God, is it? I agree that it is only one of the attributes, one related to God's omnipotence, and that the other attributes of Love, omniscience, eternity, omnipresence, must be described with different adjectives.
Every church has its purpose, and distinguishing "flagship" churches does a disservice to the general mission of the church within classis. Larger churches obviously are meetings of larger numbers of people, and perhaps the preaching, organization or location is influencing that...praise the Lord for it. But some large churches are as likely to misrepresent the gospel as some small churches are likely to struggle...I think of Joel Osteen for example. And some large churches are a bit too much people(preacher) followers rather than God followers. However, the Lord will work with all of them.
Well yes, good question. And I don't know about other consistories in general; only a few. It has been said that heresy creeps into the church quicker thru music than in any other way. Sometimes it is not just whether a song is technically correct theologically or not. Sometimes a very popular song only expresses a very limited aspect of our faith, or of our christian life, and gives us a lopsided christianity. So we need to have a good balance of songs, which is why it is good to have many to choose from. The amount of monitoring also depends sometimes on the spiritual maturity or experience or education of those who choose the songs, and the consistories confidence in their theological background. But I know I tend to have a subconscious evaluation of most songs, trying to evaluate their spiritual impact. But other times I just sing them, especially if they are familiar. I can't be analyzing all of them all the time; it leaves little room then for praise. I mean, just think of some of the Psalms, if someone wrote stuff like that today; parts of Psalm 38, 39. Pslam 40: 12, 14,15. and others. But it all has a place, part of our prayer in song.
I am wondering about our over-riding concentration on "relationship", particularly relationship with God. It seems to be a theme that reduces almost everything else to insignificance. Our ideas about God, about people, about concepts, principles, policies, ideologies all seem to get subjected to the principle and idea of "relationship". But is this not a bit of lopsided Christianity?
While relationship is very important, is not God bigger than just relationship with us? Is not there more to God than only relationship?
So Al, your statement that "God listens to our prayers and answers our prayers with our best interest in mind. " is theologically and confessionally true, but it is not soley God's purpose to only consider our own opinion of our best interest. Sometimes God's purpose is mysterious, unknown, and we can only trust His answer to our prayers, when we don't understand it. God answers even the prayers we have not yet uttered, the prayers that contradict the other prayers we make. God answers in ways much superior to the ways we would think are best. In that way, God is not tamed to our control, even though he promised to answer our prayers. God is out of our control, but not out of His own control. God is greater than the relationships He has with us, which makes his relationship with us even more amazing, more loving, more cherished.
Lots of good suggestions. But, I would like to add the most important and significant step. #1 - Pray. Pray that God will protect the children. Pray that God will protect the teachers and leaders from themselves and from others. Pray that eyes will be opened to problematic situations, and to situations that need to be corrected, whether it is a better handrailing for the elderly, a better ramp for the wheelchairs, or a better monitoring of the young children at play or in the classrooms. Pray that people will recognize their weaknesses. Pray that Christ's love may shine in our treatment of one another, and that Christ's commands to love one another are fulfilled by the leadership in the way God wants us to do. Pray that our young people may understand the committment of marriage and the place of God given sexual activity in our lives. Pray that wisdom for youth leaders, and for the young people who experience much temptation, may be given to them by God, by scripture, and by the preaching and teaching within the church.
We believe God is powerful to save, and that prayer is effectual. While not neglecting practical procedures, it is prayer that has the greatest effect, bringing safety to a whole new level in our obedience to Christ to love one another, as Christ loves us.
Verlyn, since you appear to enjoy the Greek, could you verify for me (and others) the apparent imperative in the Lord's Prayer for the statements which are called the first, second, and third requests? It would almost seem possible that these three requests are praises to God as well. ie. "hallowed be Your Name" or Hallowed is Your Name"....
Commissioned pastor sounds okay to me. All pastors are commissioned essentially, after all.
I think that the problem we have with "official" roles, and the unofficial giftings, is that they do not always correspond exactly to each other. So we have pastors who are evangelists, and apostles who are teachers, and commissioned pastors who are preachers. What does this all mean then? What is it that we are really getting hung up on? Where do the elders and deacons fit in to all of this? Why is it that the primary mention of a particular office has to do with offices of elder and deacon, and not with qualifications of teachers and pastors(commissioned or otherwise)?
I once attended a service at a church in Florida, where they did not have official pastors or ministers as such, but only elders, who functioned as preachers and pastors.
How can we separate our desire for education and a learned approach to preaching and teaching and pastoral care, from our innate human desire for categories, titles, and earthly honor? How can we honor theological learning and education appropriately, without honoring them above the necessary respect due to the gifting of the spirit within the heart of a person. How do we honor a particular office of authority, without supposing that formal education is sufficient to grant that authority?
The song "Indescribable", written by Chris Tomlin, available on the internet to read and/or listen to. Untameable is kind of the opposite of "best buddy"... Untameable is also the opposite of treating God like a pet. It's theopposite of "tameable".
To elaborate a wee bit more.... when someone says that untameable infers that it should be tameable, I think we are getting words and inferences mixed up. Untameable does not infer that it should be tameable. The word "Untamed" might infer that, or might suggest that taming is still possible. "Untameable" is different than untamed, and means that no matter how much you might try, no matter what the circumstances, God (or some animals or some people) are not controllable by others. It says nothing at all about whether they "should" be controllable.
As people, we often think or act as if God follows our lead. If we pray the right prayers, sing the right songs, read the bible and the right books, then God will give us the life we desire, and the eternity we desire. That is poor theology. Our confessions express the exact opposite, that God chooses us before we ever choose Him. That God's ways are greater than our ways, and His knowledge and understanding are far greater than ours.
As human beings, we know we can tame many animals, we know we can control even ant colonies and bee colonies, and capture animals such as giraffs, snakes, frogs. We can cut down forests, drain land, plant crops, re-route rivers, move mountains, explore the moon, maybe even change climate. We have a lot of control, and can apparently tame or control most of this earth in some ways. But we cannot do that with God, because God is greater than us. Therefore God is untameable, uncontrollable by us.
That doesn't mean that God does not keep his promises. God is still faithful and true. But God is our Lord and Master, which means that ultimately God is the initiator, not us.
Re: August's comment and Al's response: I think that spiritual leadership includes keeping an eye on the songs, particularly on the wordings of the songs, but also on how and when they are sung, and on who is leading the singing. A song leader must also exhibit spiritual leadership; they should not be living lifestyles that contradict either the songs, or the spiritual message that is presented every Sunday. However, there is not just one way of monitoring or evaluating the songs. In our worship we have a number of songs chosen by a song leader or praise team, and a number of songs chosen by the preacher. We also usually have a couple songs early on after the children's story, which is just before the main service, which are sometimes favorites selected by the children. Usually this works out okay, but sometimes they select songs which are questionable. Sometimes they are sung, sometimes the leader will divert to a different song. For example, some very young children will sometimes ask for "Twinkle, Twinkle little star", which to me is a bit, well... infantile.. but then they are very young children, after all. But Twinkle, twinkle little star can end with the line, "God has placed you where you are." Which brings it into a worship context. The problem is that if we revert to the older familiar "How I wonder what you are", then we have missed the point, and are missing an opportunity.
I would suggest that children's songs can be as much of a minefield as anything, partly because we want to humor the children, partly because we don't seem to expect as much from them. But every incident and every song is an opportunity for teaching, and if we miss that, then we are inadvertently hurting our children. And children can learn good songs just as easily as they learn bad songs and ditties. So maybe we should start there.
As a side note, we have a twelve year old girl who plays the drums and cymbals in accompaniement along with the piano and the singing, for almost every praise song and congregational hymn that we sing. She has a knack for making it blend and fit, and it is neat to see and hear.
Richard, it would seem to me that supporting someone who might be villified for his christian belief, is different than persecuting someone who is not a christian.
Ryan, is our humanity dependant on our perfection? Would you be willing to abort an imperfect baby because they are less human? It is in our humanity that we sin as human beings. It is in our humanity that Christ restores us to Himself.
Debra, Jesus talked about a man leaving his father and mother and cleaving to his wife(not a man cleaving to a man). Paul mentioned the sin of homosex, Romans 1:26–27, 1 Corinthians 6:9–10, and 1 Timothy 1:9–10 . The fact that there is no record of Jesus discussing it in detail proves nothing. It was so obviously wrong that it did not need to be discussed. No one is denying anyone the right to be celibate.
Debra, yes Paul was a flawed human being. But then, so are you. If being flawed means your view should be disregarded, then I guess your view should be disregarded. Paul was showing us how to worship Jesus, how to serve his Lord and our Lord. Paul as an apostle chosen by Christ, presented the scriptural and Godly perspective on homosex, drunkeness, slandering, swindlers,sexually immoral, greed, etc. Loving everyone does not mean loving everything that they do. There are many things that Jesus did not speak about directly but that scripture still gives us guidance on, and the apostles were able to write about that.
Posted in: Check Out the Music
Well, yes, words have different connotations for different people. This is what makes poetry and poetic prose interesting, and what also makes it a bit different from confessional and legal documents. For people in tune with nature, the zebra, the wild lion, and the hippopotamus are wild, untamed. Untamed nature like the Rocky mountains, or the Rain Forest, is majestic, natural, directly God-created. While some lions and hippos and elephants have been tamed in spite of their size and strength, the contrast is with the independance and majesty of the untamed. Untamed means beyond our control, beyond our beck and call. The essence of our relationship with God is that we cannot lead God around on a leash. God is not tamed by us. But, it is not the only word that the song uses to describe God, is it? I agree that it is only one of the attributes, one related to God's omnipotence, and that the other attributes of Love, omniscience, eternity, omnipresence, must be described with different adjectives.
Posted in: How will Classis Respond to the Change in Church Leadership Flow?
Every church has its purpose, and distinguishing "flagship" churches does a disservice to the general mission of the church within classis. Larger churches obviously are meetings of larger numbers of people, and perhaps the preaching, organization or location is influencing that...praise the Lord for it. But some large churches are as likely to misrepresent the gospel as some small churches are likely to struggle...I think of Joel Osteen for example. And some large churches are a bit too much people(preacher) followers rather than God followers. However, the Lord will work with all of them.
Posted in: Check Out the Music
Well yes, good question. And I don't know about other consistories in general; only a few. It has been said that heresy creeps into the church quicker thru music than in any other way. Sometimes it is not just whether a song is technically correct theologically or not. Sometimes a very popular song only expresses a very limited aspect of our faith, or of our christian life, and gives us a lopsided christianity. So we need to have a good balance of songs, which is why it is good to have many to choose from. The amount of monitoring also depends sometimes on the spiritual maturity or experience or education of those who choose the songs, and the consistories confidence in their theological background. But I know I tend to have a subconscious evaluation of most songs, trying to evaluate their spiritual impact. But other times I just sing them, especially if they are familiar. I can't be analyzing all of them all the time; it leaves little room then for praise. I mean, just think of some of the Psalms, if someone wrote stuff like that today; parts of Psalm 38, 39. Pslam 40: 12, 14,15. and others. But it all has a place, part of our prayer in song.
Posted in: Check Out the Music
I am wondering about our over-riding concentration on "relationship", particularly relationship with God. It seems to be a theme that reduces almost everything else to insignificance. Our ideas about God, about people, about concepts, principles, policies, ideologies all seem to get subjected to the principle and idea of "relationship". But is this not a bit of lopsided Christianity?
While relationship is very important, is not God bigger than just relationship with us? Is not there more to God than only relationship?
So Al, your statement that "God listens to our prayers and answers our prayers with our best interest in mind. " is theologically and confessionally true, but it is not soley God's purpose to only consider our own opinion of our best interest. Sometimes God's purpose is mysterious, unknown, and we can only trust His answer to our prayers, when we don't understand it. God answers even the prayers we have not yet uttered, the prayers that contradict the other prayers we make. God answers in ways much superior to the ways we would think are best. In that way, God is not tamed to our control, even though he promised to answer our prayers. God is out of our control, but not out of His own control. God is greater than the relationships He has with us, which makes his relationship with us even more amazing, more loving, more cherished.
Posted in: Ten Steps to Safe Churches
Lots of good suggestions. But, I would like to add the most important and significant step. #1 - Pray. Pray that God will protect the children. Pray that God will protect the teachers and leaders from themselves and from others. Pray that eyes will be opened to problematic situations, and to situations that need to be corrected, whether it is a better handrailing for the elderly, a better ramp for the wheelchairs, or a better monitoring of the young children at play or in the classrooms. Pray that people will recognize their weaknesses. Pray that Christ's love may shine in our treatment of one another, and that Christ's commands to love one another are fulfilled by the leadership in the way God wants us to do. Pray that our young people may understand the committment of marriage and the place of God given sexual activity in our lives. Pray that wisdom for youth leaders, and for the young people who experience much temptation, may be given to them by God, by scripture, and by the preaching and teaching within the church.
We believe God is powerful to save, and that prayer is effectual. While not neglecting practical procedures, it is prayer that has the greatest effect, bringing safety to a whole new level in our obedience to Christ to love one another, as Christ loves us.
Posted in: Using Your Hebrew and Greek
Verlyn, since you appear to enjoy the Greek, could you verify for me (and others) the apparent imperative in the Lord's Prayer for the statements which are called the first, second, and third requests? It would almost seem possible that these three requests are praises to God as well. ie. "hallowed be Your Name" or Hallowed is Your Name"....
Posted in: Commissioned Pastors: A Rose By Another Name?
Commissioned pastor sounds okay to me. All pastors are commissioned essentially, after all.
I think that the problem we have with "official" roles, and the unofficial giftings, is that they do not always correspond exactly to each other. So we have pastors who are evangelists, and apostles who are teachers, and commissioned pastors who are preachers. What does this all mean then? What is it that we are really getting hung up on? Where do the elders and deacons fit in to all of this? Why is it that the primary mention of a particular office has to do with offices of elder and deacon, and not with qualifications of teachers and pastors(commissioned or otherwise)?
I once attended a service at a church in Florida, where they did not have official pastors or ministers as such, but only elders, who functioned as preachers and pastors.
How can we separate our desire for education and a learned approach to preaching and teaching and pastoral care, from our innate human desire for categories, titles, and earthly honor? How can we honor theological learning and education appropriately, without honoring them above the necessary respect due to the gifting of the spirit within the heart of a person. How do we honor a particular office of authority, without supposing that formal education is sufficient to grant that authority?
Posted in: Check Out the Music
The song "Indescribable", written by Chris Tomlin, available on the internet to read and/or listen to. Untameable is kind of the opposite of "best buddy"... Untameable is also the opposite of treating God like a pet. It's theopposite of "tameable".
Posted in: Check Out the Music
To elaborate a wee bit more.... when someone says that untameable infers that it should be tameable, I think we are getting words and inferences mixed up. Untameable does not infer that it should be tameable. The word "Untamed" might infer that, or might suggest that taming is still possible. "Untameable" is different than untamed, and means that no matter how much you might try, no matter what the circumstances, God (or some animals or some people) are not controllable by others. It says nothing at all about whether they "should" be controllable.
As people, we often think or act as if God follows our lead. If we pray the right prayers, sing the right songs, read the bible and the right books, then God will give us the life we desire, and the eternity we desire. That is poor theology. Our confessions express the exact opposite, that God chooses us before we ever choose Him. That God's ways are greater than our ways, and His knowledge and understanding are far greater than ours.
As human beings, we know we can tame many animals, we know we can control even ant colonies and bee colonies, and capture animals such as giraffs, snakes, frogs. We can cut down forests, drain land, plant crops, re-route rivers, move mountains, explore the moon, maybe even change climate. We have a lot of control, and can apparently tame or control most of this earth in some ways. But we cannot do that with God, because God is greater than us. Therefore God is untameable, uncontrollable by us.
That doesn't mean that God does not keep his promises. God is still faithful and true. But God is our Lord and Master, which means that ultimately God is the initiator, not us.
Posted in: Check Out the Music
Re: August's comment and Al's response: I think that spiritual leadership includes keeping an eye on the songs, particularly on the wordings of the songs, but also on how and when they are sung, and on who is leading the singing. A song leader must also exhibit spiritual leadership; they should not be living lifestyles that contradict either the songs, or the spiritual message that is presented every Sunday. However, there is not just one way of monitoring or evaluating the songs. In our worship we have a number of songs chosen by a song leader or praise team, and a number of songs chosen by the preacher. We also usually have a couple songs early on after the children's story, which is just before the main service, which are sometimes favorites selected by the children. Usually this works out okay, but sometimes they select songs which are questionable. Sometimes they are sung, sometimes the leader will divert to a different song. For example, some very young children will sometimes ask for "Twinkle, Twinkle little star", which to me is a bit, well... infantile.. but then they are very young children, after all. But Twinkle, twinkle little star can end with the line, "God has placed you where you are." Which brings it into a worship context. The problem is that if we revert to the older familiar "How I wonder what you are", then we have missed the point, and are missing an opportunity.
I would suggest that children's songs can be as much of a minefield as anything, partly because we want to humor the children, partly because we don't seem to expect as much from them. But every incident and every song is an opportunity for teaching, and if we miss that, then we are inadvertently hurting our children. And children can learn good songs just as easily as they learn bad songs and ditties. So maybe we should start there.
As a side note, we have a twelve year old girl who plays the drums and cymbals in accompaniement along with the piano and the singing, for almost every praise song and congregational hymn that we sing. She has a knack for making it blend and fit, and it is neat to see and hear.
Posted in: Are You Prejudiced and the Chick-fil-A Controversy
Richard, it would seem to me that supporting someone who might be villified for his christian belief, is different than persecuting someone who is not a christian.
Ryan, is our humanity dependant on our perfection? Would you be willing to abort an imperfect baby because they are less human? It is in our humanity that we sin as human beings. It is in our humanity that Christ restores us to Himself.
Debra, Jesus talked about a man leaving his father and mother and cleaving to his wife(not a man cleaving to a man). Paul mentioned the sin of homosex, Romans 1:26–27, 1 Corinthians 6:9–10, and 1 Timothy 1:9–10 . The fact that there is no record of Jesus discussing it in detail proves nothing. It was so obviously wrong that it did not need to be discussed. No one is denying anyone the right to be celibate.
Posted in: Are You Prejudiced and the Chick-fil-A Controversy
Debra, yes Paul was a flawed human being. But then, so are you. If being flawed means your view should be disregarded, then I guess your view should be disregarded. Paul was showing us how to worship Jesus, how to serve his Lord and our Lord. Paul as an apostle chosen by Christ, presented the scriptural and Godly perspective on homosex, drunkeness, slandering, swindlers,sexually immoral, greed, etc. Loving everyone does not mean loving everything that they do. There are many things that Jesus did not speak about directly but that scripture still gives us guidance on, and the apostles were able to write about that.