Christianity 101

If You Can’t Trust the Doctor or the Preacher…

This evening I came across and rapidly scanned two pieces of commentary and/or news.

Scandal of Evangelical Dishonesty

No matter how we rationalize it, all deception within the evangelical community dishonors Christ, and serves the devil’s agenda. We need to identify deception, repent of it, and embrace the truth of Christ which will set us free to represent Him accurately to a world sick of being lied to John 8:32.

[…]

I take no pleasure in addressing these issues. I hope it will serve Christ’s body by initiating some much-needed self-examination and dialogue.

Which Christian colleges, missions organizations, speakers, musicians, publishers, and authors will come forward and confess past misleading practices and commit themselves to the highest ethical standards before the Audience of One, even if it means forgoing financial gain? Who will, in the name of Christ, raise the bar of honesty, integrity, and truth?

Only when Christian leaders establish new and higher standards will others feel the positive peer pressure and accountability to do the same. Only then will reform be widespread, with direct unspun truth-telling becoming the established norm.

Only then will we gain the trust of both the Christian public and a skeptical secular culture accustomed to deception, but desperately needing the truth.

That one is a very lengthy exposé. See what you think of it.

Well, that was the preacher part of the title. Next, the doctor part:

Retracted autism study an ‘elaborate fraud,’ British journal finds

A now-retracted British study that linked autism to childhood vaccines was an “elaborate fraud” that has done long-lasting damage to public health, a leading medical publication reported Wednesday.

[…]

The now-discredited paper panicked many parents and led to a sharp drop in the number of children getting the vaccine that prevents measles, mumps and rubella. Vaccination rates dropped sharply in Britain after its publication, falling as low as 80% by 2004. Measles cases have gone up sharply in the ensuing years.

In the United States, more cases of measles were reported in 2008 than in any other year since 1997, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. More than 90% of those infected had not been vaccinated or their vaccination status was unknown, the CDC reported.

And there you are.

😳 Oooops! I didn’t mean it that way! I’m not suggesting the deception highlighted above is a shoe that fits your foot.

While we can point fingers and wag tongues against others’ deception, who can discern and discard the guile lurking in his own heart?

Confronting Evil

Earlier this morning, I read and commented a bit on Psalm 121. Then I came across this:

The bottom line is simple to state but far more complex to practice and effectively put in place. Evil must be confronted. To confront evil, it must first be identified and branded as such. And as a Christian, I must not confront evil with evil. And there is where the rubber meets the road, there is where the struggle becomes real, there is where, if I can add a bottom line to the bottom line, I need help.

And so I commit this year to be constantly seeking that help. Sadly, because I know myself, I’ll need help in adhering to that commitment but I know from whence that help originates.

Source: What will the New Year bring?

How must a Christian confront evil?

Part of the answer: with good and with blessing.

What’s more of the answer?

Now what I wrote earlier this morning: My Help.

Neat Little Things from God

Special Request

I made a special request of the Lord recently. Never would have done that in the past. It happened on a day that I was overcome with a sensation of intense beauty. To be overcome with beauty is to know a moment of transcendence, and to have that is to desire it again.

I asked the Lord if he would grant me to taste beauty every day, even just a fleeting glimpse of it. He knew what I meant: I was requesting not only to be presented with objective beauty, but also the subjective apparatus—to be given the capacity to be overwhelmed.

Then I went on my way and did not always remember my petition. But the Lord remembered, and daily he has been coming through with delight. One day it was….

Each time this happened, I suddenly remembered that I had asked the Lord, and so I recognized that these were no random cosmic acts but intimate winks from my Father, the giver of perfect gifts, with Whom there is no shadow of turning.

Again I say, Andrée Seu!

Imperfect Good Samaritan

Of course all these cases were more complex than a brief mention can convey. And of course US foreign policy, under presidents from Nixon to Obama, has accomplished enormous good in the world — including, at times, the saving of many lives.

Yet the good America has done is dwarfed by the good America could have done. Too often we have been willing to disregard unspeakable evil in the mistaken belief that preventing atrocities is not “an American concern.” Kissinger’s words to Nixon that day in 1973 were repellent. The mindset behind them has been all too common.

Those are the closing two paragraphs of Yes, genocide is ‘an American concern’ by Jeff Jacoby.

I’m wondering, though, what lessons the article has for me as a Christian — lessons in responding to the needs of those who are outside my various circles and thus don’t touch or affect me directly.

Non-Accountable Christians — What’s With That?!

Many of the exhortations in the Bible are not popular in today’s world. But a new study by the Barna Group indicates that one of the least favorite biblical principles might well be “Obey your spiritual leaders, and do what they say. Their work is to watch over your souls, and they are accountable to God. Give them reason to do this with joy and not with sorrow” Hebrews 13:17, NLT.

Because the underlying theme of the Christian life is one of being transformed from a selfish and self-driven individual to one who lives for and surrenders control of one’s life to God, the practice of accountability for life choices and behavior is central to that process of transformation. Yet, a national survey by the Barna Group among people who describe themselves as Christian and involved in a church discovered that only 5% indicated that their church does anything to hold them accountable for integrating biblical beliefs and principles into their life.

As a member of a congregation with a written set of (minimum) standards, I find this to be an interesting poll/study/survey.

And I’m curious where you and your congregation would have shown up in it.

That aside, here’s a little more from the above article:

“Barna Group studies among pastors and other church leaders have consistently shown that such leaders have a distaste for initiating any type of confrontation and conflict with congregants. Another barrier is that many followers of Christ are uncertain about the difference between judgment and discernment. Not wanting to be judgmental, they therefore avoid all conversation about the other person’s behavior—except, sometimes, gossip.

“One of the cornerstones of the biblical concept of community is that of mutual accountability. But Americans these days cherish privacy and freedom to the extent that the very idea of being held accountable by others—even those with their best interests in mind, or who have a legal or spiritual authority to do so—is considered inappropriate, antiquated and rigid. With a large majority of Christian churches proclaiming that people should know, trust and obey all of the behavioral principles taught in the Bible, overlooking a principle as foundational as accountability breeds even more public confusion about scriptural authority and faith-based community, as well as personal behavioral responsibility.”

Anyway, here’s the full story: The Barna Group – National Study Describes Christian Accountability Provided by Churches

Above all, love God!
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