Sin Can’t Have a Green Card

As I’m working through the book of Romans with a group of great guys at Christ Church Santa Fe, I am struck by how often the questions of the role of sin in the Christian life come up.  This question makes sense and comes up in the book of Romans in chapter 6, but it’s at least in the background throughout the whole book.  We are utilizing a study guide put together by Tim Keller and Redeemer Church New York, and it is a great tool for our study, but still, this question lingers.

One way I have found helpful in answering this question is by using a “green card” analogy.  Here’s what I mean:

Because of your union with Christ, sin can’t have a green card in your life. It can’t claim citizenship (status), nor should it apply for permanent residence (progress).  In union with Christ, what is true of Him, is true (justification) and will be true (glorification) of you as well.

Best book on Marriage for $2.99 Today

Hey folks,

The best book on Marriage that I have read in a long time, and what formed a good bit of the recent teaching series I did on the subject, is on sale for $2.99 today for Kindle (device or apps).  It is worth it at full price, but this is another steal worth taking advantage of.

The Meaning of Marriage by Tim and Kathy Keller

» The Affection of Christ Alone Keller Quotes

» The Affection of Christ Alone Keller Quotes.

This is a great one from Tim Keller.  Enjoy!

Sometimes God seems to be killing us

“Something is safe for us to maintain in our lives only if it has really stopped being an idol.  That can happen only when we are truly willing to live without it, when we truly say from the heart: ‘Because I have God, I can live without you.’…Sometimes God seems to be killing us when he’s actually saving us.”

- Tim Keller, Counterfeit Gods:The Empty Promises of Money, Sex and Power,  and the Only Hope that Matters

 

Below, you’ll find a short video of Keller explaining why he wrote the book in the first place.  Enjoy!

Context Matters Alot

Context…

Its being talked about alot these days.  In Christian ministry circles there’s no little debate on the issue of contextualization - how much should we try to reflect our specific context it in order to speak into it – as well as original context – what was happening in the setting that the Biblical authors were writing into.

I find it interesting that often times, there are people who can speak intelligently into this conversation who often times have no direct tie in to it.  One such person is David Brooks, a New York Times Op-Ed Columnist.  Yes, that David Brooks, who as you all know wrote Bobos in Paradise and On Paradise Drive, and who I undoubtedly heard about from, you guessed it, Tim Keller).

Here’s an interesting thought from his recent column regarding the current economic crisis:

Markets tend toward efficiency. People respond in pretty straightforward ways to incentives. The invisible hand forms a spontaneous, dynamic order. Economic behavior can be accurately predicted through elegant models

This view explains a lot, but not the current financial crisis — how so many people could be so stupid, incompetent and self-destructive all at once. The crisis has delivered a blow to classical economics and taken a body of psychological work that was at the edge of public policy thought and brought it front and center.

In this new body of thought, you get a very different picture of human nature. Reason is not like a rider atop a horse. Instead, each person’s mind contains a panoply of instincts, strategies, intuitions, emotions, memories and habits, which vie for supremacy. An irregular, idiosyncratic and largely unconscious process determines which of these internal players gets to control behavior at any instant. Context — which stimulus triggers which response — matters a lot.

You can see this reality in everything – from the debate of Christians regarding the role and place of culture in the context of ministry, to Oprah falling off the wagon of her diet and physical transformation of six years, to the current financial state our country finds itself in.

What amazes me about Brooks’ piece is that he bases his argument in human nature, not financial policy or historical trend.  Maybe one way of contextualizing the “cultural mandate” is to say that everyone is responsible for and a responder to their cultural environment.  Or, everyone is subject to external and internal triggers that stimulate a response, of which, only reason can be considered one such trigger.

I wonder, if this is universally held to be true, how this would effect our understanding and appropriation of older models of codified knowledge, such as systematic theology, or matters of  contemporary contextualization?

I’m asking this as a guy who loves his Christian heritage of the Reformed tradition, even the formulations of Christian doctrine found in the Westminster Confession of Faith.

I do believe, however, that noting is context-less, and these invisible stimuli are more important and impactful then perhaps we have historically assented to, both in discerning the original context within which various issues and doctrines were raised and formulated, as well as their current usage and appropriation.

Context matters, alot.

Tim Keller on Denominational Renewal

Well,

It’s actually Tim Keller commenting on Greg Thompson’s talk from the 2008 PCA Denominational Renewal conference, and I think it is well worth the time linking and encouraging you all to read.

Click here for the full article.  Here’s a sampling:

As I read this terrific piece, however, it made me think about how we actually will have to do denominational renewal. The PCA is the great and tense place that it is because it is perhaps the only Presbyterian denomination that hasn’t purged or lost one or two of its historic wings. George Marsden says that Reformed churches have always had what he called ‘doctrinalist’, ‘pietist,’ and ‘cultural-transformationist’ wings. Weirdly, they all grow out of aspects of Reformed theology. Historically, they’ve produced some major splits–Old Side (doctrinalist) from New Side (pietist) in the 18^th century, Old School (doctrinalist/pietist) from New School (reformist) in the 19^th century. The OPC, though a doctrinalist church, grew and then shed a pietist wing (New Life Churches.) The CRC, though basically a cultural-transformationist denomination, had a doctrinalist split off (the URC.) In God’s providence, the PCA has significant numbers in all three wings.

Monday Stuff

Here are some links to recent articles and posts I have found interesting over this past week on the web:

Tim Challies reviews Bart Ehrman’s new book God’s Problem: How the Bible Fails to Answer Our Most Important Question—Why We Suffer.  Worth checking out (especially if you won’t read Ehrman’s book on its own).  I always find Tim’s reviews helpful.  Plus his sight The Discerning Reader is a great site and resource.

Graeme Goldsworthy lectures at Southern Seminary on the necessity and application of Biblical Theology – both in the seminary and the pulpit. (I admit, I have not listened to these yet, but I plan to this week). [Thanks to Justin Taylor for the link].

There’s an interesting post on how to assess and interview potential missional community leaders, thanks to Drew Goodmason of Kaleo Church in San Diego (Acts 29).  I find Drew’s thoughts extremely insightful as a would be church planter in the somewhat foreseeable future.

This was actually a very insightful and helpful post from Zen Habits, on Emotional Intelligence. I usually think I am emotionally aware of myself and everyone else around me.  Time and experience continues to prove me wrong.  These little things help from time to time.

Oh yeah…and Tim Keller’s newest new book.  No, not this book, but this one.

Contemporary or Contextual – What would Keller do?

Well, Tim Keller’s new book is almost out – The Reason for God (Hey honey, if you’re thinking of any last minute Valentine’s gift ideas, this might be a good one.) – and low and behold there is quite a buzz swarming over the internet (here, here, here, here and here). Not only that, but Keller made it into a Newsweek piece. (I especially like the line about him being compared to your favorite “dim sum” place in Manhattan).

Here is a comment made by Ed Stetzer after visiting Redeemer Church in New York (Tim Keller’s church) regarding an interesting, and important thing to remember whenever we talk about “contextualization”:

“I was most impressed with how, well, non-”hip” the service was. (The giveaway was the note in the program reminding you to not applaud.)

The “band” was four men in suits who played wind instruments accompanied by an organ.

Yet, most of the crowd was young and engaged… a reminder that contemporary is not always contextual.”

I think that statement is worth pondering some, don’t you guys? When did I, or we, ever begin to equate contextual with contemporary? I think that Stetzer nails it, and sees beyond the “transferable practices” of some successful church strategy’s, to the transferable principle of making the Gospel truth relevant and understandable for your context.

At the end of the Newsweek piece on Keller, the author makes another interesting comment. After picking up on some the anomalies that make Tim Keller a bit “odd” for the typical perceptions of pastors, she states that New York is a good place for someone as idiosyncratic as Keller, and she muses whether, “he—or his vision—will ever be at home anywhere else.”

I think that the writer of the article has expressed an important aspect of ministry and calling, but particularly for future and would-be church planters. When you consider whatever ministry it is that you think God is calling you to, ask yourself, “Would you or your vision be at home anywhere else?” A great question, and one to ponder before heading out into planting a church. If you don’t have a sense of what God can do and wants to do through His church under your charge for a specific city/town/area, then maybe you’re not really ready to minister.

Just something I’m thinking about. What are your thoughts?

Tim Keller’s New Book & Various Resources

Well, Tim Keller’s new book is almost out - The Reason for God. Have your pre-ordered your copy of it? I would, if my seminary book expense wasn’t as large as it was. Somehow I’ll get my hands on it I’m sure.

If you want some reasons to go buy the book, go check out the recent interview Justin Taylor did with Dr. Keller over at Between Two Worlds.

Also, go check out Colin Adams’ blog (Unashamed Workman) for a semi-recent interview with Tim Keller on preaching and ministry (Click here).

And if its possible that you don’t know of the quintessential Tim Keller resource site on the internet, go over and check out Steve McCoy’s blog, which is well worth the read and subscription any day, even when not talking about all-stuff-Keller: Reformissionary.

Early Review of Tim Keller’s new book

Review might be overstating it, but it is an early endorsement of it here.