pinakidion.*

Before

• Reconstructions
• Pruning
• Missions Evangelist
• World Sectors
• Boston School of World Missions

After

• Restorations
• Remnant
• Overseeing Evangelist
• World Mission Societies
• Portland School of World Missions

Ever wonder why I don’t believe there’s been any change in Portland? This is a good illustration of it. I wish I could take credit for it, but it was written by someone else.

From the Emergent Convention, the last day was spent creating a statement of faith, if you will. I’m sure that the emergent folks will take issue with what I called it - so rather than get into a meaningless argument over words, here is what was posted:

1. Commitment to God in the Way of Jesus:

We are committed to doing justice, loving kindness, and walking humbly with God, as the Scriptures teach. In the words of Jesus, we seek to live by the Great Commandment: loving God and loving our neighbors – including those who might be considered “the least of these” or enemies. We understand the gospel to be centered in Jesus and his message of the kingdom of God, a message of reconciliation with God and among humanity.

We are committed to a “generous orthodoxy” in faith and practice – affirming the historic Christian faith and the Biblical injunction to love one another even when we disagree. We embrace historic spiritual practices such as prayer, meditation, contemplation, study, solitude, silence, service, and fellowship, believing that healthy theology cannot be separated from healthy spirituality.

2. Commitment to the Church in all its Forms:

We are committed to honor and serve the church in all its forms – Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Protestant, Pentecostal. We practice “deep ecclesiology” – rather than favoring some forms of the church and critiquing or rejecting others, we see that every form of the church has both weaknesses and strengths, both liabilities and potential. We believe the rampant injustice and sin in our world requires the sincere, collaborative, and whole-hearted response of all Christians in all denominations, from the most historic and hierarchical, through the mid-range of local and congregational churches, to the most spontaneous and informal expressions. We affirm both the value of strengthening, renewing, and transitioning existing churches and organizations, and the need for planting, resourcing, and coaching new ones of many kinds. We seek to be irenic and inclusive of all our Christian sisters and brothers, rather than elitist and critical, seeing “us” we were used to see “us versus them.” We own the many failures of the church as our failures, which humbles us and calls us to repentance, and we also celebrate the many heroes and virtues of the church, which inspires us and gives us hope.

3. Commitment to God’s World:

We practice our faith missionally – that is, we do not isolate ourselves from this world, but rather, we follow Christ into the world. We seek to fulfill the mission of God in our generations, and then to pass the baton faithfully to the next generations as well. We believe the church exists for the benefit and blessing of the world at large; we seek therefore not to be blessed to the exclusion of everyone else, but rather for the benefit of everyone else. We see the earth and all it contains as God’s beloved creation, and so we join God in seeking its good, its healing, and its blessing.

4. Commitment to One Another

In order to strengthen our shared faith and resolve, and in order to encourage and learn from one another in our diversity through respectful, sacred conversation, we value time and interaction with other friends who share this rule and its practices. We identify ourselves as members of this growing, global, generative, and non-exclusive friendship. We welcome others into this friendship as well. We bring whatever resources we can to enrich this shared faith and resolve.

Coming from a church that specializes in making up its own rules and saying nothing with a flood of words, the above makes me suspicious. I am suspicious because it really doesn’t say anything. This makes it hard for me, personally, to hear. I am also aware that it affects objective thought about what was put forth. Oddly enough, though, I probably believe in much of it even if I do not sound like it. Maybe it is the English Major in me that feels that the wonder of a thing is lost when it is explained. For example, when poetry is covered in Freshman English in college, the wonder and enjoyment of the poem is usually trampled by its metaphor, meter, and meaning. After a complete dissection, it’s no wonder that few enjoy the poem anymore. However, I read in the Bible that continual meditation and study of the Scriptures will yield good things. It won’t save you, but it will empower you to overcome sin and not be swayed by all kinds of strange teachings.

I want to think over this some more and give it a fair shake.

Assignment for next devo.

Hebrews 13:5

Just a few things of note:

I’m simplifying the categories so that the list isn’t so long. The bad thing is that the only way to do this is post by post. Seems that the only mass change I can make is to “general”. When this is done, the category list will be much shorter, and will, of course, incluse “Are Belong to Us”.

The other thing is that I changed one of the wikis on the site to be a repository of all the phrases I make up. I don’t want to force everyone to use my vocabulary, but I want to provide a translation device between the weird form of English I use and what’s normal to the rest of the world. You can find the Phrase Mint(tm) here, though all the entries are not completed yet.

Otherwise, I’m off to my wife’s graduation from training this afternoon.

By the way, if you get the chance, go read a couple articles from the latest edition of Credenda Agenda.

Don’t Believe So

This is about how evangelicals and fundamentalists are different.

Forgiveness

This one is a really good article about what happens when you forgive someone that needs forgiveness despite the fact that they don’t ask for it. The main idea I came away with was that it not only takes humility to forgive someone, but that it takes humility to receive that forgiveness.

Emerging Theology

If this is what the emergent movement is trying to be, then this is what I can get behind. Of course, when folks start talking about a narrative and poetry, it makes it sound like the Church of the English Majors(TM).

As I said earlier, there is an image of the ultrasound from last week that now sits in a frame on my desk. I have it handy to remember what’s truly important. One of my personal weaknesses is that I can focus on what is most urgent instead of what’s most important.

I think of my child and I want the world to be a better place for him/her. I also want him/her to enjoy all the good things on planet Earth and enjoy the benefits provided by my income, where we live, and the families that love him/her. There is so much good and so much potential for good that it makes me smile. There is so much evil that it makes me upset. In either case, I want to do something about the good and the bad.

TD Jakes was right when he said that most Christians are shaking their fist when they step up to the microphone. In other words, the only time you hear from Christians, they are against something or fighting against something. Looking back at most of my columns, I can safely say that I’m the same way.

I work in a school system and that is quite enjoyable at times. I wanted to make note of one of these times today.

Our Title 1 Office puts out a newsletter every month and their latest edition has the encouraging story of a fifth grade student that has overcome great challenges in her life. She was born premature with one functioning kidney and possible brain development issues. Her mother passed away when she was 3. Her father raised her as best he could (despite sever rhuematoid arthritis), but he also passed away two years later. Moving in with her grandmother, she began a new journey.

The article points out that she missed oportunities like Head Start, pre-school, and the like. It wasn’t that they weren’t available, it was that her family circumstances didn’t allow it to happen. In any case, she and her grandmother worked hard to overcome these obstacles.

What struck me was that she was unassuming, yet hopes to be a lawyer. She is aware of what she’s been through without claiming to be a victim of anything. It reminds me of Jesus’ words to become like little children to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. It also serves as a challenge to Americans like me that can so easily become ‘victims’ of one circumstance or another instead of overcomers. Jesus also spoke in Revelation about those that overcome - granted the context is different, but it makes me think of it all the same. The crown goes to the overcomer, I guess the lawyers’ fees go to the victim.

I’m glad that the school system chooses to recognize those that overcome so much. It welcome news on a Thursday when my thoughts tend to focus on “things below” instead of focusing on things above.

For awhile, I’ve been moving about the Christianity Blogosphere. Sometimes I comment, sometimes I read and think about what the author has said, sometimes I read and delete the site address from my history. I enjoy reading the different blogs because I believe strongly in outside perspective. I am part of a fellowship of churches whose top leaders seem to be terrified of outside perspectives, mainly due to doctrinal concerns. I don’t say this as a bystander, I’ve spoken to many of them. I also look at the example of their lives, sometimes they encouraged me to do for years.

In any case, I have learned one thing from reading all these blogs: Solomon was right in that there is no end to the making of books.

Seriously, I have learned other things as well. The list is in no particular order.

1. Some bloggers want to debate for the sake of debating
2. Some bloggers will not discuss anything with those that strongly disagree with them.
3. Some bloggers ask for discussion, but don’t want it.
4. Some bloggers ask for discussion, but don’t receive it.
5. Some bloggers are very proud of their denomination while others are ashamed of it.
6. Some bloggers are good exegetes while others are not.
7. Finally, some bloggers are fascinated only with new ideas while others will not budge from their preconceived notions at all.

It’s an amazing variety, and I believe that it is important that this variety continues to exist. Where would we be without others that see things from a different perspective? Better yet, where would we be if some of our friends weren’t reluctant to try new ideas? It’s true that we need those that we jump at any new idea as much as we need those that will not abandon old ones.

What good are those that refuse to change? Much. Primarily, they are each still an individual creation of God. Even if they get on our nerves, He still delights in them. Outside of that, they can be the influence to prevent us from jumping on the latest religious bandwagon. They can help us to take time to think through various issues, methods, and the like. In a society that ridicules people with strong opinions as narrow-minded, it is refreshing to find those that believe in SOMETHING passionately, even if it is wrong. They are sometimes right and that is something that each person has to wrestle with on their own.

Not to be mean, but they can also serve as examples of ‘what not to do’. I read the writings of some ministers that refuse to change their doctrine and methods and just cringe. I don’t cringe because they are unyielding, but because reading their defense of their beliefs and methods is so painful. The urge to shake them and shout “WAKE UP” is very powerful sometimes. However, without them, we have no persistent example to avoid. Imagine Christianity if the lessons of previous generations had to be learned anew in every generation. To a degree, this may seem to be true anyway, but I submit that if this were true, American Evangelicalism wouldn’t have gone through the various movements this past century. Instead, the stages would cycle much more quickly.

We had the Jesus People of the 60s and 70s, then various movements involved in shepherding, then various movements concerned with church growth, now the new thing is the emergent church. I’m sure that the next big thing after this will be some kind of return to institutionalized churches. I would think that if we learned nothing from previous generations, we would stop reacting to them, but would recycle the same ideas over and over.

Personally, I tend to have a hard time with folks on either extreme. Fortunately, the number of people on either one is pretty small. Stubborn people can change and flighty folks can dig in their heels - I’ve seen both happen. Although we need the few on the fringes, they shouldn’t be immune from correction or even a rebuke. Make no mistake, I believe we need these folks, but needing them doesn’t make them right. I talk about one such person frequently here because despite more than a few talking and pleading with him to change, he refuses. He seems to have a real inability to see another perspective or be anything less than the man on top of the pyramid. Pretty soon, I will be writing about someone else that flits around like a butterfly without settling on anything. The teachings and ministry of this person is just as destructive.

Speaking of Thomas, we learn today that his way is still biblical and all others are not. We also learn that Nationalism is now considered a sin. Apprarently, it is similar to autonomy (which he also calls a sin). Lastly, two years is roughly the limit for healing from past hurts. Anything beyond this is apparently tolerating sin.

Lovely.

As far as flighty goes, this post describes some of the things I’ve encountered with the emergent church crowd. It’s funny, in my own fellowship of churches, I’m seen as a way out there radical. To the emergent folks I’ve encountered so far, I’m seen as way out there conservative. Go figure. I enjoy a good challenge to my thinking even if some of those that provide the challenge have little ability to receive one in return.

I would love to go to the Emergent Convention. Reading through the topics, I would love to be in on almost all of them just to hear some new ideas, especially those about leadership. Oh well. I certainly hope that those who go will post about it.

Speaking of a good challenge, my old friend and I are discussing one of the branches of TULIP, Perseverence of the saints. I know that he wrestled with it for qutie a long time and does not believe in it lightly. I enjoy discussing it with him, especially as we do not regard each other as ‘unsaved’ because of our different perspectives. Definitely some good things to think about. Keep it up, who knows where the conversation will go.

Anywho, that’s it for today.

Set Theory I

There’s something unsatisfactory about my first post regarding set theory. I’m not sure what it is, but part of it is a lack of precision.

First, let’s pretend that there’s no difference between what is true and what is perceived. Further, let’s define the terms more precisely. There is a set, S, whose members make up the church. Which church? Well, that can cause problems just trying to sort that out. The church universal means different things, the church local presupposes certain things, and so on. Therefore, let say that we are looking at those who are saved. You may even call this group ‘the elect’.

Ok, we are trying to determine the members of set S where members are defined as those that are saved.

Going back to the territorial model, those that are saved are within a certain area surrounding God. It may be a circle, a square, or an irregular polygon. In other words, any point within a certain distance of God is saved. A point may be ‘to the right’ of God, another ‘to the left’, etc, but both must be within a certain distance to God depending on where they are located in relation to God. Maintaining the definition that the saved are within a certain specified area around God, let’s just say that the boundary of this area is a circle. This simplifies the definition further: those within a certain radius of God are saved.

This model presents some problems, as previously stated in the first article. The outer boundary, in extreme cases, is confused with the boundary of the local church membership. At the most extreme, oen may believe that the boundary is smaller than that, meaning that not everyone in their local church is saved, much less those outside of it. However, some may be less ‘narrow-minded’ and consider the boundary to be the edges of their particular denomination. Others may be more broad than that, still others may simply see the boundary as Christian, and yet others may declare there is no boundary at all.

The one thing in common is a focus on exactly where the boundary may be and the exact distance of the radius from God that allows a person to be saved. It’s natural, children push at boundaries set by parents in part because they want to know where the boundary actually exists. Once they know where the boundary is, it provides a sense of security. Yet, looking at those who are saved or not saved in this can cause a person to be concerned about their position and the position of others. The apostles argued about this on more than one occasion. James and John Zebedee asked to be on the left and right of Jesus. Jesus made it clear that jockeying for position to be closest to him is not the right line of thinking. Besides, God determines those things, not us.

This brings us to the relational model. In this model, the members of set S are determined by their direction toward a central point, God. Because of each members’ connection to God, the set that defines those who are saved looks like a series a lines emmanating from the center, instead of a defined area of space. (From a poetical standpoint, one might even say that it is the sparkle of God.) The advantage of this model is that thinking of ‘those that are saved’ is less of a specific area, but a common focus on God. Thinking this way, the set has a more dynamic membership that changes frequently. It also makes it difficult, if not impossible, for a person to know who is a member of set S without a relationship to other members.

Naturally, this may lead members to believe that set S has far fewer members than it really contains. Unlike the territory model, a relationship must exist between members to determine movement toward a common goal. Unfortunately, it is much easier to determine if someone is moving in a parallel direction. When looking for those moving in the same direction, most are not travelling toward the center at all. The other drawback to this model is that God draws people to Him before they are saved. In other words, it is possible to be drawn to God, even if you are not saved. Paul discusses this in Athens (Acts 17:27) and Peter says this at Pentecost (Acts 2:39).

One separate issue I want to think about is what happens when a member changes direction. Because the model defines members of set S as those moving toward a common goal, the instant a member changes direction, they cease being a member of set S. In other words, the moment a person stops heading toward God, they are no longer saved. I’m sure that this was not intended, but it is a logical deduction from the definition. One could say that a person’s ‘overall direction’ meaning that more of their direction is toward the center than not. This explanation is only partially satisfying, it seems to gloss over any change in direction at all.

So what then? Is it possible to define set S to include those that are saved AND moving towards God? I believe so. Let’s go back to the idea of the area that defines those that are saved. It is easy to say that the barrier is doctrine. Those with right doctrine are in the area, those without it are outside. However, it doesn’t accurately account for movement within the area. Doctrine is not usually so flexible as to allow much movement. One could have doctrines that are fuzzy, but again, that is only partially satisfying.

I propose this: the defined area is the area of God’s grace. One could even say that grace is the radius of God. The Bible does say that His grace, though vast, is not infinite. It also says that those that are not saved are not under grace. The main reason for using grace as the area is that it allows for movement. Romans 14 mentions several disputable matters and Paul basically encourages members to not undermine another’s faith, but it’s okay to believe two different things (in regards to disputable matters). Also, there are times in every Christian’s life when we do NOT fix our eyes on God. Rather than say that we are no longer saved at that point, it is more accurate to say that we are under grace at that point. However, if we mantain the same direction, we will eventually move outside God’s grace because there is no sacrifice for sin left when we deliberately and continually sin against God.

The only problem with this model is that it does not allow for Reformed theology at all. By its assumptions, it excludes even mild forms of Calvinism. As such, I’ll go back to work to think through that, but it may be a while before I explore that.

I was reading an article on church as set theory and I enjoyed it. I know it appeals to my visual side and my mathematical side, but I also like the idea that those that make up the members of the church are not always set, or necessarily known by any one person. I believe that many under the ‘territorial’ model see the gates of Heaven and the doors to their fellowship of local churches as the same thing.

I thought about it for awhile and decided that I wanted to expand on it a bit. I’m not saying this is any better or worse, it is just what went through my mind as I thought about set theory. Read more…

Premise
Try this on for size: most of the best Christian authors are dead.

Ramblings
If I try to think of authors today that will be quoted by folks in 20 years, I can only think of a bare few. In fact, I can only think of one at the moment- Philipp Yancey. There should also be room for Fee and Stuart, though I believe that they will probably never write a third book together.

What about Max Lucado? Rick Warren? Tim LaHaye? Yes, I know that LaHaye wrote books before Left Behind. Yes, I have still never read a Max Lucado book (no reason, just haven’t).

I read from authors like Brian McLaren and others about the emerging church and enjoy their insight into modern culture. However, anyone that has to coin new words and phrases to describe God, Jesus, his Church, and other theological concepts in English just isn’t trying. At this point, English has more words that are not used than some languages possess in their vocabulary. We have words that differentiate between an animal and the food the animal becomes (i.e. lamb & mutton, deer & venison). We have words for the fear of a specific number. We have floccinaucinihilipilification. We have almost one hundred words for shades of blue. We have a dictionary that comes in 20 volumes and is four feet long when stacked horizontally. What is the necessity in expounding on concepts described in a series of letters written in an adopted second language by creating words and phrases unavailable in a 500,000 word vocabulary after hundreds of years of study? There isn’t. It is simply lazy thinking.

Why do I favor dead writers? They aren’t in it for money anymore, they know how to think, they know how to use words, and they know how to read a book. Give me Tozer. Give me Spurgeon. (Do you know he could sell out theathers at speaking engagements?) Even give me Matthew Henry. How about Cotton Mather and John Wesley?

Coda
In any case, the link at the beginning is food for thought. For the record, I am not against emergent church theology. I am against the need to coin new words and phrases to decribe things. For example, calling a local church a tribe. No local church I have been to has ever operated in the same context or even with the same connations as a tribe. County School Board is a more accurate phrase to my experience. However, I am not against the concept that our current culture (Postmodern is a category of art) has different needs in understanding the Gospel than the generation that preceeded it. The Gospel as understood by the original teachers and students was spoken to a world very different from our own. Without a good way to translate across the divide (called hermenutics), the message can be warped or misunderstood.

I saw the baby today. Up until this point, the baby felt like an abstract concept. True, I felt great about being a dad and I wanted to do all I could to help my wife. She is starting to show a little and last night I even talked to the baby.

Still, I can’t describe the difference between the reality of our child before today and the reality now.

Our prayers have been answered thus far: ten fingers, ten toes. I saw each one. What a marvelous thing to see God knitting a life in my wife’s womb. It’s funny, I didn’t really hear the nurse go through the checklist of potential problems. I heard her happiness in sharing with us and I heard my wife’s joy and relief that the baby is okay.

Sometime later, what I am feeling is becoming more clear.

I am incredibly happy that I will be a father. It’s a word that always meant someone else to me, and now this word can be used to describe me as well. It’s not that I get to stand up on father’s day, or even that I can share stories with my own father. It’s the beginning of something new that at one point I thought would be denied to me for the rest of my life. Two years ago, I had given up on any hope of being a father and had given my heart into what I considered my ministry.

Having it become a reality now is another sign to me that God does hear my prayers. I wept in bitterness that I was living a life that was not my own. Now, God has given me a life that I know is His and mine. I understand that my life is on loan from him and that he could call me anywhere - he did it once before when I packed up my car and drove 2200 miles to a town where I knew no one at all. (My first night, I couldn’t even find a hotel room or a gas station to buy a town map.) In any case, I feel like God told me that I could make some choices and that he wouldn’t abandon me if I made a bad one. In the meantime, he hasn’t been like the God of the Deists that just watches from afar, He’s helped me along the way. Point is, I feel like God and I are walking together in my life instead of how I saw him before as the micromanager of my life.

My wife and I ask God to know His will. I hope that the choices we have made will honor Him. In the meantime, I am enjoying this special time to simply be in awe at the creation of life. A life entrusted to the care of me and my best friend. This is probably the happiest day of my life to this point and I wanted to share it.

God bless all of you today and everyday.

I have been reading the writings of Wade Hodges lately. I enjoy his insights into various issues around the church of christ. Definitely worth a read to stimulate the brain cells.

The Eferians tend to live in small communities located east of the Awrelian Demarcation in forests. The Hesberians have named them Eferians because they are presumed to be similar to hawks in their behavior and social structure. The Eferian refer to themselves as “KeetKeet”.

Eferians tend to live in thatched homes, but no bare ground floors. The thatch is actually partially woven. Every home has a tree nearby that belongs to the family.

Eferian travellers carry a special apparatus that they can add thatch to in order to sleep in a tree, they will not sleep on the bare ground. If no straw is available, an Eferians will sleep standing up, something they can do easily.

Once every generation, an Eferus is born with tiny feathers that cover the body. They are shed within the first year, but the Eferians consider the child born with feathers to be a child favored of their gods. Such a child is given the name -Dejgej- (remember that the Hesberians use ‘j’ to denote a semivowel instead of ‘y’) that they carry their entire lives.

Physically, Eferians are very thin and average a little over six feet tall. They have a large skull with a sloping forehead, but it is narrower than an Ogdan skull.

Salguod has posted some thoughts on People as Projects.

The only thing that I can add is that this appears to be the result of an imbalanced emphsasis on growth over maturity. It is not unique to the ICC, but in fact appears in certain cell church stuctures. If the goals are to the grow the group, split it to plant another group, and keep growing, it is inevitable that those that are not 100% ‘with the program’ are going to be treated as someone that needs to be fixed. The heart may be to help the person, but it is only heart enough to get them ‘on track’ and nothing more. (In this case, I’m talking about consistently demonstrated lack of enthusiasm and participation, not an off-week.)

This is treating a person as a project in much the same way we look at a leaky faucet or a picture crookedly hung on a wall.

The answer is also not to love them more. This is only a different approach to fixing the problem. The difference is that it is wrapped in a soft teddy-bear covering, but it is still just an approach to fix some perceived problem with a person that is not ‘on track’.

What is the answer? Not to harken images of a C- movie, but sometimes you need to ask the right question. If there is someone in your small group that isn’t as excited about growth as everyone else, the issue may not be the indvidual. Think about it, if you have to ‘love up on them’ to figure out what’s wrong, then the group hasn’t been functioning the entire time. That makes the question more about what the group is supposed to do instead of what needs to happen to fix one member of the group.

Want a real mindbender? Sometimes there is no problem at all. Each person is trying their best to meet needs and reach out to the community, the group is meeting together and active in each other’s lives, but the results are not particularly stellar. It’s not a problem to be fixed. Instead of thinking about what-if scenarios, sometimes the answer is that there is no question. In other words, there isn’t a problem at all. In the parable of the sower, it is God that makes things grow. Ask any farmer - there are some days when you cannot do anything but wait.

Just some thoughts, read his article, it is better.

This is just food for thought, but Jerry Bernard thinks through the order of Paul’s letters in a different way. I like the fact that he explains why he initally thought one way and then why he changed before demonstrating his reasoning.

I don’t agree with some of his conclusions on other topics (Things that ended in the first century), I don’t even agree with him on the timeline of Paul’s letters. However, it isn’t an unreasonable approach and so it deserves some consideration.

Initally, there was an first-come, first-serve bruhaha in Baltimore and two weeks later, there is a ’symposium’ in LA. One person attending both these events was in Gerogia in early April and will go back in June. Another person involved in both events will be in Seattle next month. A third person involved in both events will fly to Kansas next month. This doesn’t even address the trips by various folks from the beginning of the year until March.

Is this really worth it? True, unity shouldn’t have a price tag. I’d hate to be someone to say ‘no’ for purely financial reasons when there is a greater good possible. My question is, how many trips should someone take in a year? Isn’t there another way? These days it’s cheaper to rent a videoconference room for $100/hr at Kinko’s than to fly someone back and forth somewhere and put them up in a hotel. Email is relatively free. Even calling long distance with a good cellphone is very inexpensive.

Sure, I’d love to do everything in person. When I travelled as a consultant, I didn’t enjoy the customers that called me constantly, but didn’t want me to visit. It was very inconvienient. However, they were my customers, so I couldn’t force an in-person visit on them if they didn’t want to have me. Besides, it was much cheaper to call, so they had no real reason to fly me in. After a while, they even gave me VPN access to their network. I didn’t need to visit them at all.

The following article was written in 1988. It makes points in a more straightforward way than I did. Below is a quoted section:

Before returning to the Father He commanded His followers: “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. He who believes and is baptized will be saved” (Mark 16:15,16). In the wording of Matthew 28:19,20 they were told: “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you.”

It has been argued that since ‘make disciples’ (second person plural aorist imperative active) is the main verb of the sentence and ‘going,’ ‘baptizing’ and ‘teaching’ are participles, discipling includes both baptizing and teaching to observe all things.

Whom are we to disciple? All the nations. Nations (accusative) is the direct object of the verb ‘disciple.’ If ‘disciple’ as a verb means what advocates of authoritarian discipleship claim, is it possible to disciple a nation? Of course not. In most versions this verb is correctly translated ‘to make disciples of.’ Then it makes sense. ‘Make disciples of all the nations.’ That is possible.

Whom are we to baptize and teach to observe all things? Is it possible to baptize a nation? Greek pronouns usually agree in gender with their antecedent. ‘Nations’ is neuter; ‘them’ in verses 19 and 20 is masculine. It is to be understood — as is stated in Mark — that only those who believe are to be baptized. “He who believes and is baptized will be saved” (Mark 16:16). And whom are you going to teach to observe all things? One who doesn’t believe? One who refuses to be baptized? Or one who has believed, has been baptized, and has been made a disciple? You are not going to make much progress teaching someone to observe all things until AFTER he has become a disciple!

Disciples ARE to be taught to observe all that their Master has commanded. They ARE to grow to maturity in Christ. But this is not called ‘discipling’ in the New Testament. And the above passages certainly say nothing about becoming the disciple of someone OTHER THAN CHRIST.

The way to make disciples is to preach the gospel. “When they had preached the gospel to that city and made many disciples, they returned to Lystra, Iconium and Antioch, strengthening the souls of the disciples” (Acts 14:21,22). A subordinate relationship with some other disciple is not required in ‘making disciples’ or ‘discipling’ (the verb form is used in this passage).

Wish I had found this a month ago, it would have been simpler to provide a link. I found this today and I was struck that both of us used the example of early Methodism. How seredipitous is that?

A UFE is an undocumented feature enhancement. Thanks to slashdot, I found that instead of fixing issues that can cause the dreaded blue screen of death, they have simply created a red screen of death.

Can’t wait for the upgrade. I’m guessing it will be the Chartreuse (R127, G255, B0) Screen of Death.

My wife and I are expecting a baby in October.

Told you it was a big announcement. Waited until I called family to post it here. I wanted to call everyone, but there’s so many, I wanted you to know now rather than later.

That means no trip to Greece for me this year, and that is a touch sad. We enjoyed Rome last year a great deal. It was fun. I was going to have a paper this year and everything. I don’t call it the Great Paperchase(TM) for nothing. Guess we’ll save that for another year.