Whether Church or State, Disputes Usually Get Personal

Remember when the plan was 15 days to flatten the curve? John MacArthur does. The statement on his church's website is too long to read, but from skimming it you get the gist. God established three institutions: family, church, and state. When the state tells the church when and how to worship, that's jumping jurisdictions.

MacArthur says the church answers not to Caesar, but to Christ. I'm sure many would affirm that truth without condoning Grace Community's mass gatherings. The statement's addendum says the church initially suspended services to do their part in flattening the curve. But, because we now see that earlier "horrific projections of death . . . were wrong and the virus is nowhere near as dangerous as originally feared," the church should resume meeting needs that it can only meet by meeting in person.

In other words (my words), MacArthur was ok with flattening the curve, but because the virus underperformed, he's not interested in trying to flatline the curve, which pushes its presence into perpetuity.

I don't have the answers on all this. I will say we're being naïve if we think anyone is being strictly objective right now. That's not how humans work.

Disputes usually get personal. When you challenge Caesar's authority, he always takes it personally. Granted, human church leaders are human as well. Who is more so playing by the rules, and who is mainly threatening to take their ball and go home? To really make that distinction, you often have to be on the playground yourself.

California is not my playground. I'm not saying we shouldn't care whether California churches answer to Caesar or Christ. I'm only saying we have a greater responsibility to do what we can here. In that regard, I read some useful thoughts from Will Willimon.

Willimon looks to Barth's responses to German nationalism for coronacoping ideas. Will finds Barth emphasizing the church's mission to preach “Jesus Christ is Lord."

He describes Barth as "refusing to be jerked around by what the world regarded as momentous, earth-shaking events." Instead, he encouraged believers to "deal with the shock that God has, in Jesus Christ, made our history God’s." That shock raises the question, "How then shall we live now that we know the truth?"

My hope for John MacArthur is the same as for my own church's leadership—that we navigate this situation in light of God making our history his own in Jesus. 

 

On Being Back In Church

Being back at church Sunday didn't feel too weird, even with the masks and socially distanced seating. It felt normal compared to not being there at all. On the way in, I reminded my kids not to hug or kiss anyone. Dad, we never kiss anyone at church!

The weirdest part was the recorded message after the service. A familiar voice used an airport tone to tell us to get out—the sooner you get out, the sooner the people who have to clean all the pews can go home. She didn't actually say that. Maybe she should have.

Our church even asked us to leave the whole building immediately. I get it, but that's a hard ask. Visiting—next to singing with people singing all around you—is the chief difference between worshiping at church and watching at home. We stopped for just one conversation in the lobby, and I was rushing us through that one. I try to play by the rules, I guess.

How Long?

In the service I found myself wishing we would celebrate communion. That was the last thing we were going to do. But, it would be the first thing to do if we were going all the way from watching in homes to worshiping in one house. Going all the way was never the plan for the first Sunday back. When will it be? That reminds us of the psalmist's inquiry, How long?

How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever?

How long will you hide your face from me?

How long must I take counsel in my soul

   and have sorrow in my heart all the day?

How long shall my enemy be exalted over me? (Psalm 13:1–2)

Sure, I know it isn't as bad as that. For one thing, we're the ones hiding our faces. If we worship in person, but file in and out like automatons, are we living with the virus, or hiding from it? Granted, I don't bear the burden of making these decisions for my church. I imagine those who do would say, Yes, we're living with the virus; hiding from it is telling everyone to stay home.

What Do We Do?

I guess I'm feeling ready to live in spite of the virus. That I feel as such doesn't make it wise. So, what do we do?

We look to heaven and say, How long?  How long until the Spirit gives our leadership confidence that it's time to meet and greet? We trust our leaders to listen to the Spirit for that guidance. In the meantime, some of us will wear mask, and some of us won't—liberty in the non-essentials, right? It's the same policy we've always had for instructions like this one:

Greet one another with a holy kiss. 
(2 Corinthians 13:12)

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Follow the bikes to the book!

On Hymns We Used To Sing And Hear

Years ago I started looking for a good CD (that's how long ago it was) with all the hymns we used to sing in church. I wanted my children to know Blessed Assurance, Sweet Hour of Prayer, The Old Rugged Cross, All Creatures of Our God and King, and a hundred others, and I knew they wouldn't learn them at our church.

Yes, hymns make appearances at our church, but precious few get sung even in consecutive years, and those often have new-fangled praise choruses forcibly inserted.

I know I'm once again sounding like old, bitter grownup church kid. But, I do have something positive to say. I have finally found that CD—albeit not physically, but on Spotify, which I hadn't heard of when I began this quest.

The answer proved to be Baptist Hymnal Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 by Tony Weeks. These recordings are not what I set out to find. I wanted something that sounded close to how the hymns were sung at my home church. I thought that would be easy to find. It was not.

Tony Weeks' recordings are not close to my hymn-singing background either. But, by the time I discovered him, I was desperate. And these acoustic-guitar renditions are very listenable (after all, who really drives to the park with a pipe organ and choir as the soundtrack). They reflect the same spirit as congregational hymn singing. These albums don't so much sound like the Sunday mornings of my youth, but they feel like them. They stand in the stream of tradition.

That's really the crux of the matter, right? I want my children to know the songs I sang as a child in church, in part because my parents and grandparents and beyond sang the same songs. And, if you'll permit my bitter traditionalist persona to pose a question:

When was the last time we sang Awesome God? When was the last time we sang Oceans? We sang the hymns for generations, but when a song is written for the moment, that's exactly how long it's good for.

Follow the bikes to the book!

Why Don't Baptists Say The Apostles' Creed?

Will Willimon says he didn't think much of Dogmatics in Outline when he first read it, just that Bart sounded like "some kind of conservative." Well, sure. Dogmatics in Outline is Barth's brief commentary on the Apostles' Creed, and anyone doing right by the Creed should sound like a conservative, because the Creed is so faithful to Scripture. One might respond, Yes, but the Creed is not Scripture. That line of thought must be why I never heard of the Creed—at least not at church—in my evangelical upbringing.

If we neglect the Creed simply because it is not Scripture, we might ask whether we need any theology at all. Why not just read the Bible, and only the Bible? We can answer that question with one word—Trinity. It's a word not found in the Bible, but it helps us understand what the Bible teaches about God. The same is true of the Apostles' Creed.

The Creed concisely states fundamental Christian beliefs that are taught throughout different places in the Bible. The ESV Following Jesus Bible has a page on the Creed that matches up 23 biblical references to specific items.

One might argue we would do better to memorize the 23 Scripture passages. OK, but, the Creed is easier to learn and easier to share. If we learned the 23 passages, we'd also need to learn some way to understand and communicate how they fit together. Given this usefulness of the Creed, we again ask, why don't Southern Baptist use it?

In answering this question, Google reminded me that Al Mohler wrote a book on the Apostles' Creed just last year. In this interview, he says Creed aversion usually stems from a fear that we'll emphasize the Creed above Scripture. I get that. I respect the concern that we not confuse anyone on what is authoritative. At the same time, this position brings us back to the difficulty of a "nothing but the Bible" approach. If that's our stance, we need to throw out the Hymnal. [My church already did so, but that's a different story.]

Mohler also says that if we don't use the Creed, we'll need to make up some other summation of our faith. Mohler warns against that. The Apostles' Creed has stood the test of time for good reason. That reminds me of Stanley Hauerwas' comment that Christianity is something we receive, not something we make up as we go along.

I enjoyed Dogmatics in Outline. I don't know if I'll read Mohler's book, but I do plan to read Ben Myers'. I used to enjoy his blog. (It's still here, but someone else posts on it now.)

If you don't know the Creed, I encourage you to learn it. It's a good thing to carry around with you (in your head). You'll find yourself remembering it on occasion. You'll read or hear something and think about how it connects to the Creed.

I can't predict how referring to it may go over in your Sunday school class, but, if you run into Dr. Willimon, maybe he'll think you're some kind of conservative, like Karl Barth.

Church, But Don't Touch?

I saw a frog on the walking trail last night, but not before I scared him. He was hopping away before I could get a good look. I went back to walking, and thinking—wondering about when and how we'll return to church.

Maybe your church sent out a survey like the one we had last week. The question boiled down to something like:

Are you . . .

• ready to come back
• ready to come back but not touch anybody
• not ready to come back

I posed the question a little differently to our Sunday school class. I asked whether folks would rather return sooner, but with restrictions, or return later without restrictions.

Our opinions will not affect policy, but I wanted to give everyone a chance to share what they were thinking. I didn't actually count, but I think the responses were roughly, six for returning later, five for returning sooner.

Our teacher commented that we're going to have restrictions regardless, whether it's sooner or later. That was more realism than I bargained for.

When I imagine going back to church, I have two pictures in mind—inspired by the survey questions. The first picture has families spread out across the sanctuary, with lots of space between the little groups. But, we're still in one room; singing together. That picture seems pretty good right now.

The other picture is one-way pedestrian traffic at the entrances. I don't like that picture. It strikes me as dystopian. But, if that's how we need to come into the building to make the first picture reality, well—we do what we gotta do.

One day—at least in theory—we'll settle into some new normal. The question is how close the new church normal will be to the old church normal. Who can say? I hope it involves social nearing as soon as possible. I hope we're able to get at least as close to each other as I got to this guy.

In Which I Say Nothing About Ear Lobes, Thumbs, And Big Toes

As we continue our online "services" and "gatherings," I find myself wondering why we call our gatherings, services to begin with. That question led me to this post by Anthony Smith. His comments led me to work up this definition.

Just as the Lord called Israel out of Egypt to serve him, and just as the priests served by offering sacrifices, so now all believers serve as priests in offering the sacrifices of praise. We gather together to perform this service. (cf. Exod 10:3; Lev 7:35; 1 Pet 2:5; 1 Tim 2:1;  Heb 13:15)

We don't think of ourselves as preserving the Levitical-ritual tradition when we gather on Sunday morning. Maybe we sometimes think about the Psalmic-festival tradition; let us come into the house of the Lord, enter his gates with praise, that kind of thing. The closest we get to Leviticus is communion. Rather than making any blood sacrifice, we remember the only sufficient blood sacrifice.

I look forward to once again gathering physically in the same place to perform services. Or, perform might not be the best word. We don't want to hold performances and call them worship. Let's just say we long to gather together to serve.

Might we do well to soften the division between worship and service? Maybe we'd congratulate ourselves less if we called cleaning up the playground a worship project. Maybe we'd approach worship more seriously if we saw ourselves as Aaron's sons and daughters.

I'm saying nothing new here. It's only the idea that the servant on the back row should have the same spirit as the servant in the choir. We cannot make that happen. But, if we can do anything to make it more likely, our return to offline service gatherings would be great timing!