Grace and Government Increase

This was originally posted in October 2010, but I thought it was particularly relevant with the events of yesterday and the upholding of the individual mandate in the ACA.  Wherever government grows, the church suffers.  The book of Revelation is the story of governmental-approved persecution and killing of Christians.  However, that is not the most scary part of government growth.  The most scary part is the fact that when government grows, grace dies.
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I have noticed a disturbing trend in Western society in the last forty years.  Europe, once the hotbed of Christianity, has been thoroughly secularized with church attendance hovering around a whopping 8-9% in most places.  Although America has yet to reach these low numbers, the trend is definitely going that way.

Whenever the church decreases, government increases.  There is not a nation in the world where a strong church and a large government exist- in fact they cannot coexist.  Government only grows when it takes on issues that only the Gospel was intended to take on.


Why should anyone other than a minister care about this?  Well, one thing that I have noticed is that with the decreasing influence of the church comes a decreasing emphasis on grace.  Grace is disappearing from our society as people turn their backs on faith and walk away from the church.  However, the problems still remain.  People are still concerned about divorce, violence, crime, homelessness, etc.  There still exists a desire for some kind of morality- people still hate being lied to, cheated on, cut off in traffic, treated unfairly, etc.  So what is the answer?

When grace leaves a society, the only thing left is legislation.  If people cannot deal with evil by grace, they have to deal with it by making more and more rules to govern an increasingly corrupt and rebellious society.  As Christianity has left the continent of Europe, government there has grown by leaps and bounds.  We see socialist states in the western part, and for a good part of the last century, communist states in the eastern part.  Government has grown and taken over more and more of life as the power of the Christian faith, and the power of grace, has subsided.

The same is true in America.  If American society does not embrace the grace found in the Gospel of Jesus, we too will see an increasingly alarming turn towards more and more legislation, as the world tries to deal with the problem of morality and evil in the only way it knows how to handle it.  More rules.  More guidelines.  More laws.  More government programs to create a fair society- one that can only be created through God's kingdom.  America needs to wake up and see that as grace disappears from society, rules and regulations increase.  As faith in Christ disappears, and the love and morality that goes with it disappears, we will see more and more governmental regulation and oversight.

The answer isn't smaller government.  The answer is grace.  That's what this world needs.  But if the United States doesn't wake up and realize its need for grace, it will find itself under increasing government control.  I prefer grace.

Loving what destroys us

"I'm 39 years old and I just destroyed everything that means anything to me- my fiance, my job, my home . . .  everything."

I was on the phone with a guy who had hit rock bottom- seems like I'm getting that call more and more frequently these days.  We agreed to meet for lunch and talk about turning his life over to Jesus.  On the way there, I thought to myself, "What would cause a man to do something so horrible that it would cost him everything that means anything to him?"

As I talked with this broken man, he opened up and told me that his out-of-control drinking had done it.  He said, "I just can't seem to stop.  The pressure just gets to me and drinking is the only thing that calms me down."  He went on to tell me about his most recent binge, winding up in the hospital talking to a nurse who told him that with his blood alcohol level he should have died three times over.  He was now living in his sister's garage on a cot with all he possesses in the world right there with him.

He asked me, "Why can't I give drinking up?  I have hurt everyone I know, it's not good for me, it has taken everything from me .  . .  why can't I give it up?"

I tend to be a very blunt guy- there's really no point when you are a pastor to beat around the bush and be politically correct about everything.  I said, "Because deep inside your heart, you still love it."

How do I know this?  I know this because there are sins that I love.  I hate what they do in my life, I hate the pain they cause to my Lord and Savior, I hate the consequences of them, but in the deep places of my heart, I still love them.  I am unwilling to truly let go of them because I love them. 

I told this man, "Until your hate of drinking is greater than your love of drinking, you will continue to go down this same path."

He was very quiet.  Then he said, "You're right.  I do love to drink.  That's my problem.  No wonder I can't quit, even after all the pain it's caused."

I told him that when he surrenders his life to Jesus, an amazing thing happens.  The Holy Spirit, which is the part of God that dwells within us and leads us and guides us, takes our passions and loves and directs them to the things we were originally designed to love.  The fall of man in Genesis 3 was more than simply eating forbidden fruit.  Something drastically changed within us- our hearts began to thirst after things that would eventually destroy us.  That is why conversion and surrender to Jesus is so vitally important in this life- without Jesus, we love what will eventually destroy us.

It makes no sense.  Is there anyone who loves cancer?  Anyone who loves bubonic plague, or AIDS, or tuberculosis?  No.  However, there are people who love alcohol and won't give it up, regardless of the pain it causes.  There are people who love extramarital sex, regardless of the pain and heartache it causes.  There are people who love money, regardless of Jesus' teaching on materialism.  There are people who love comfort and ease, regardless of the call of Jesus to forsake ease and live passionately and purposefully. 

True conversion happens when we begin to love the Son of God more than we love the things that destroy us.  Looking at Christianity through that lens, sometimes I wonder if I have truly ever become a Christian.  Praise God for His grace and love for a fallen person like me.


Psalm 66:17-19 says, "I cried out to him with my mouth; his praise was on my tongue.  If I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened;  but God has surely listened and heard my voice in prayer."

The solution to Emerson's life of quiet desperation

"Most men lead lives of quiet desperation."- Ralph Waldo Emerson

I have been heavily influenced by the writings of John Eldredge.  His book "Wild At Heart" is a game changer for men who are struggling in life (I also need to give a shout-out to two other books that I like even better- "Walking With God" and "Waking the Dead").

Ralph Waldo Emerson hit the nail on the head.  Most men I know are not thriving.  They are dying.  Beneath the facade of the nice car and the nice house in the suburbs and the thorough knowledge of whatever sports team they happen to like, most men I know are quietly despairing. 

The more men I talk with as a pastor, the more I see how many men are not only despairing, but also very angry.  They are angry at ex's, angry at clients, angry at bosses- or just simply angry at life.  There doesn't seem to be an answer for what is galling them.  After a while, that anger simply turns to resignation.  Defeatism.  Disconnection from life. 

In February, I went on a pretty hardcore mission trip to Nepal and India.  I was gone for 18 days, teaching church planting to pastors, preaching, baptizing, and holding open-air gospel meetings.  Both of these countries are hostile to the gospel, Nepal in particular, which carries a three-year jail sentence for anyone who converts to Christianity.  We did ministry in the interior parts of Nepal, where there was very little electricity- we ate meals over an open fire, froze at nighttime, and were disconnected from the outside world for most of the time.  We had to hike about 5 km to a Himalayan mountain stream to baptize the 23 converts from Hinduism that had accepted Christ that weekend.  And I had never, never felt so alive. 

People ask me why I am a Christian.  The main reason I am a Christian is because I have personally experienced Jesus and He inspires me like no other.  I have to admit, however, that part of the reason, a big part of the reason, that I am a Christian is that it is the challenge above all challenges, the risk above all risks, and the adrenalin rush bigger than anything I've ever experienced.

In John Eldredge's book, "Wild at Heart," he states that all men need three things.  The first is that we all need a battle to fight.  We were made for battle.  We were made to take on challenges and conquer them.  The second thing is that we all need an adventure to live.  That's true.  The third thing we need is a beauty to rescue.

I have found that only the Gospel of Jesus fulfills those three needs within me.  I think one of the reasons why men lead lives of quiet desperation is that we are fighting the wrong battle.  We're fighting for a bigger piece of the pie here in this world when we should be fighting for our families, our children, our wives, and our communities.  We are living the wrong adventure- living vicariously through professional athletes on tv when the world, uncared for medically, unevangelized, unloved, goes from bad to worse.  Orphans being sold into sexual slavery, children dying because of unclean water- Jesus is calling all the bored men out there to live the real adventure.  Embrace it!  Feel the aliveness!  Instead, we get a bigger tv and a nicer surround-sound stereo so we can experience adventure from the safety of our couches.  No wonder men are leading lives of quiet desperation.

In John 10:10 Jesus says, "I have come that you may have life, and have it to the full."  I have found that to be true.  The gospel of Jesus is the only solution to Emerson's observation.  I say we embrace it.

Choosing My Trump Card

My wife's family introduced me to Euchre several years ago.  For all of you who don't live north of the Ohio river, it's a card game where having a "trump card" is vitally important.  The trump card is what wins the hand, regardless of anything else that has been played.

For me, in my life, I struggle with what my trump card is.  As a Christian, I desire for Scripture to be my trump card.  Whatever Scripture says should be the final word on the matter on everything- from career decisions to right vs wrong to use of money and everything in between.

However, I'm afraid that many times, my feelings are the trump card.  For example, Scripture tells me that God will never leave nor forsake me.  However, there are times when I don't feel close to God.  I can't hear His voice, I don't know if He cares- I'm not really even sure He is there.  I am inclined to let my feelings trump what Scripture says.  I guess that is part of being human.

I see this in American Christians all the time.  In our society, "how we feel" has become the final word on everything.  If we "feel" something is wrong, it is wrong.  If we "feel" something is right, it is right.  If we "feel" that someone doesn't like us, they don't like us.  If we "feel" that Scripture is harsh, or wrong, or judgmental, then it is harsh, wrong, and judgmental. 

I think one of the ways God calls us to grow as Christians is to keep the "feelings" (that He created, by the way- there is nothing wrong with them) in their right place.  Feelings were never meant to lead.  Despite what the Jedi teach us, feelings are not always based on truth and following them isn't always the right course.  We have allowed how we feel about something to become the trump card in our lives, and by doing so, allowed these subjective, transient thoughts determine right and wrong, good and bad, true and false.

As the Holy Spirit continues to mold and make us, rounding off our rough edges, we need to move Scripture to its right place in our lives.  It is the trump card.  Scripture, not how we "feel," has the final say on values, morals, use of time, use of money, relationships, love, career, etc.  This is the call for all those who claim Jesus as Lord and Savior. 

Simple Formula for Successful Parenting

My parents had a very simple formula for parenting.  Very simple.  It went something like this:

"Have as few rules as possible, and enforce every single one of them."

That's it.  They were the masters of keeping it simple.  Their rules for my brother and I were:
1) Keep the language clean
2) Be in when we tell you to be in
3) Do your best in school
4) Respect mom and dad

That was pretty much it.  I'm sure there were others from time to time, but my parents never felt the need to burden us with all kinds of rules and regulations.  They didn't feel it was necessary to micromanage our lives nor provide us with entertainment and keep us busy.

However, if you crossed one of the lines, they nailed you.  Hard.  And it wasn't at all pleasant.

I remember one time I came in at 12:30 instead of 12:00.  My dad was still awake.  He gave me the look, and told me that tomorrow wouldn't be pleasant.  It wasn't.

He woke me up at 6 am, which is pure torture to a high school senior on a Saturday.  He had about 500 bags of mulch which I had to spread out- took me at least four hours.  I could hear the kids down the street playing in the pool while I labored in the hot sun.  To make it worse, the entire time I was mulching, he was aerating the yard, tearing up weeds.  So, when I was done, I had to lay down sod in the areas he tore up. It wound up taking all day- a Saturday ruined.  All for a lousy 30 minutes on a clock.

You can bet I was home before midnight the next week.

My advice to parents is to follow my parents' formula.  Keep the rules limited, but enforce every one of them.  I believe that our society is moving away from the belief that enforcing rules is important.  Too many parents stick up for their kids when their kids break rules.  Parents will now go to the school and blame the principal or the teacher for their kids' bad behavior, instead of punishing the kid.  I know friends of mine who will ground their kid for a week . . . . and then let the kid off after two days. 

News flash to parents- enforcing your own rules will not make your kid a social outcast.  It will not make your kid need therapy as an adult, nor will it damage his or her precious psyche or emotional makeup.  Will it make him or her mad?  Sure.  Will you hear complaining and whining and moaning?  Yes.  Will you be accused of "ruining their lives?"  Probably (I've always liked that one).

But you will be a good parent.  Your kids will thank you later.  And believe me, they will be in by midnight.

News flash to parents: Your children aren't your friends

I have seen photos like this floating around facebook for some time:

Actually, a daughter is not a promise that you will have a friend forever.  Your daughter, or your son, is a promise that you will be a parent forever.

What I have found as a pastor who does a lot of family counseling over the years is that when mom and dad's relationship is distant or nonexistant, there is a tendency for either the mom or the dad to look for their spousal needs to be met through their children; sort of a "My husband won't love me, so maybe my child will" attitude. 

The results of this are terrible.  Mothers who are overly bonded to their children and rely on their children for friendship and/or partnership build up tremendous resentment in their children, especially in their sons.  We have a society full of men who are resentful towards women because of the emotional needs their overly bonded mothers placed on them when they were young.  Children who are overly bonded to their parents, especially their mothers, have problems forming other relationships and friendships.

We also have a generation of parents who would rather hang out with their kids than parent their kids.  Your children will have many friends in their lifetimes- they will come and go.  However, they will only have one mother and father.  They need discipline, wisdom, and yes- that will include you being "mean" or being a "jerk" sometimes. 

I had great parents.  Did I like them all the time?  No.  Were they "unreasonable," "mean," and "out to ruin my life?"  Absolutely.  Thank goodness they were.  Their best parenting moments were the ones I resented the most, because it would have been much easier to give in to the tantrums and whines of their youngest son.  Because they didn't, they formed my character. 

My dad didn't particularly care if I was happy.  Neither did my mom.  They didn't see friendship with me as a good thing or even a desirable thing.  If you asked my dad, "How important to you, as a dad, is being a good friend to your son?" he would have answered, "About as important as a good kick in the butt, which is what he needs." 

My parents were more concerned with me being GOOD.  They were more concerned with me having values, morals, and making right decisions than they were with my happiness.  They were more concerned with molding me and shaping me into a real man than they were about me fulfilling some kind of emotional need for friendship that was unfulfilled in their lives.  I thank them every day for that.

Maybe when we stop viewing our children as "promises that we will have friends forever" and begin viewing them as people that God has placed in our lives to parent, we will be on the right track.  Parenting our children is an important thing.  Being friends with our kids is not.

The Truth Doesn't Really Matter in America

I was watching the news, and the story about Attorney General Eric Holder and the Fast and Furious scandal came on.  The news anchor said something that stuck in my mind.  He said, "With 22 Republicans and 16 Democrats on the committee, they easily have 51%.  They have the votes." 

This touched off sadness within me.  I don't particularly like Eric Holder- I think he's a terrible Attorney General, but that doesn't really matter.  What makes me sad is the death of truth.  No one is interested in the facts of the case, it seems.  It just seems that the 22 Republicans will vote against him and the 16 Democrats will vote for him.

Shame on both parties.  If he's innocent, shame on the 22 Republicans for voting to charge him with contempt.  If he's guilty, shame on the 16 Democrats voting to not charge him with contempt.  When agenda trumps truth, something within us dies.  The part of us that is noble, pure, just, and right recedes and the part of us that is greedy, agenda-driven, and impure takes over.  Now, what we see in our country is the latter side of us run amuck.

Proverbs 17:15 says, "Acquitting the guilty and condemning the innocent - the Lord detests them both." God's word calls for justice- for the innocent to be acquitted and the guilty to be charged.  His word does not call for acquitting of people with the same agenda as us, nor for condemning people with different agendas as us.  His word calls for judgment based on truth.  


This is how we are supposed to make decisions- upon truth.  Sadly, fewer and fewer people in this country I love so very much have a hunger for truth. 

5 Things I Wish I Had Done in My Twenties

Now that I am closer to 40 than I am to 30, I look back and wish I would have done at least five things in my previous decade.  Hopefully you young twentysomethings out there will do these five things and find yourself in a better position when YOU are 38.  I wish I would have:

1.  Bought stocks.  The best time to invest money is in the early twenties so that it can grow with compound interest over the years.  The problem?  I HAD no money in my early twenties.  But, I look at finances now and wish I would have foregone some of the luxuries I felt I had to have and bought stocks.  Lesson learned.

2.  Worn sunscreen.  I'm now having to have pre-cancerous spots treated every year because I thought sunscreen was "stupid."  When my mom reminded me that I could get skin cancer when I was 40, I said, "Well, by the time you're forty, your life is pretty much over anyway, so who cares?"  Sigh.

3.  Found a mentor.  I've had to figure out most of ministry on my own, not because there weren't willing people ready to help, but because I didn't want to listen to anyone.  Now I am just figuring things out at age 38 that people could have easily shown me at age 23.

4.  Written more.  I have no real recollection of my children's early years.  They were such a blur, and we were literally holding on hour to hour.  Now that my kids are approaching the teenage years, I would really like to know what thoughts go on at each stage of fatherhood.  I also would like a record of my walk with Christ- my understanding of theology, Scripture, and who God is. 

5.  Become a Navy Seal.  Well, maybe not, but it would have still been cool.

Fatherless America

Yesterday was the annual reminder for so many kids that they are missing what other kids have.  A father.

Yes, we all have heard the statistics about men abandoning their responsibilities like scared children and running from the task of sacrificial love that fatherhood requires.  Yes, we have all heard the pep talks and the challenges of men needing to step up so that our nation will be healthy.


But yesterday I realized that our nation was missing ITS Father.


Children without fathers have it hard.  We all know this is true.  However, have we ever thought that nations without a heavenly Father have it hard too? 


It's all over the Bible.  The times when Israel walked with God and followed His ways were fantastic.  They had peace on all sides from their enemies, they prospered, and they felt the blessing of God in their land. 


Then they forgot. 


Then they walked away. 


Then they began to fail.


Is America Fatherless?  Well, the answer is yes and no.  Our Father has not abandoned us to the pursuit of His own pleasure or lack of caring.  He has not orphaned us as people nor as a country.


It's just that we as a nation don't want Him around- unless there is a terrorist attack and some of us get real religious and spiritual for about a week, while other of us blame Him for caring about us as much as we care about Him.


But the plain and simple fact is that we in America bear the marks of a fatherless child.  Most of us are trying to figure out life on our own, like fatherless children with no one to guide them.  Most of us are concentrating mostly on the immediate moment instead of thinking long-term with purpose (like children without a father's wisdom to guide).  We are engaging in behavior- spending habits, time-management habits, and destructive relationship patterns that lack the wisdom of an older, more mature person- most of which leave us empty and hurt.


Most orphans I know- if they knew they had a father waiting for them to return- would run like a bat out of hades to that father.  I just wonder how long America will orphan itself from the love, care, guidance, and discipline of our loving Heavenly Father. 

"But Daddy!  My backhand is my strongest stroke!" And she burst into tears.

My daughter Casey is a tennis buff.  She loves it- eats it, breathes it, loves it.  A little too much, it seems.  She got her first injury a few days ago.

Her left wrist was hurting, so we went to the doctor to find out what was wrong.  Turns out, it was not a big deal, but the doctor said, "No backhands for a few days."

I've been reading in John Eldredge's book "Walking With God" and remembered a story he shared about being thrown from a horse and breaking both arms the day before hunting season began.  He began ranting and raving at God for the misfortune.  Then, in the book, he said that he was so focused on what had been TAKEN from him that he missed the gift God had given him- time with family, refocusing on God, etc.

I asked Casey what she thought the gift in this situation was.  She looked at me like I had two heads.  "Gift?" 

I said, "Many times, we are so focused on what has been taken from us that we miss the gift God gives us."  I'm real original.  "So what is the gift in this situation?"

She said, "Maybe . . . . .  working on my forehand?"

I said, "That may be one of them.  Has this injury, and your impatience in dealing with it, maybe shown you that you are too driven when it comes to tennis and are in danger of making it an idol to displace God?"

How good are you at missing the gifts God gives you because all you can focus on is what has been taken from you?

I was never taught how to walk with God.

I'm sure that walking with God- going through life with the constant presence and leadership of the Holy Spirit- was talked about and read about in my early life, and I'm sure that there were people that tried to show me what it was like, but the plain and simple fact is that I completely missed the boat.

I remember sitting in class my first year in seminary and hearing the professor talk about the leadership of the Holy Spirit.  I felt like the Ephesian believers in Acts 19- Paul asked them, "Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?"  They answered, "We haven't even heard that there IS a Holy Spirit."

I would imagine that most people that flock to our pews on Sunday are in the same boat.  They get prayer, they get the Bible, they get worship, they may even get the whole giving/tithing thing, but most really don't get the Holy Spirit.  I completely understand- I didn't either and to some extent, still don't.  However, I will say that over the last six months, the reality of the fellowship of the Holy Spirit in my life has been astounding.

I am learning that the Holy Spirit speaks to me all day long.  He has directions and guidance for even the things that I think aren't worth His attention.  He speaks words of comfort when I am stressed or doubting.  He constantly points me to Jesus, constantly bringing my sins to the forefront of my conscience so they can be repented of, and constantly reshapes me into someone who literally knows the mind of Christ (John 16:14)

I think there are many stages that we go through as believers.  The first stage is simply one of getting your sins forgiven.  That's about all that is on the radar- how do I get my sins forgiven and get into heaven?  Stage 2 happens when we realize that simply having our sins forgiven and "going to heaven" doesn't really mean much unless there is life change to go along with it.  So, at stage 2, we begin trimming off bad behavior.  We stop cussing (at least in front of our Christian friends), avoid bad movies, preset K-love and Air-1 into our car stereos, and maybe even make some radical changes to lifestyles such as breaking up with a boyfriend or girlfriend and/or eliminating addictions.

Stage 1 is all about getting new beliefs.  Stage 2 is all about getting new behavior.  I am not knocking these stages.  They are important and necessary and very, very Biblical.  However, a person who has only experienced stage 1 or stage 2 still doesn't get what Christianity is all about.

It isn't until Stage 3 happens that we begin to truly see Biblical Christianity.  Stage 3 is when the person learns to trust and listen to the leadership of the Holy Spirit.  God moves from being impersonal to very personal.  We learn to listen and hear God's voice.  We begin to see all of life through HIS eyes, not ours.  We become less and less concerned with doing the right things (and avoiding the wrong things) and begin to become more and more concerned with following His leadership from moment to moment, day to day, month to month, and year to year.

But people will say, "That's dangerous!"  Of course it is.  We all know people who have "heard God's voice" that have gone off and done stupid and crazy things.  That's why God set up the testimony of two witnesses as the way to ascertain truth.  In a Jewish court, no one could be convicted without the testimony of two witnesses.  In the same way, the Holy Spirit works with Scripture to give us the truth.  The Holy Spirit never leads us to things that contradict Scripture.

Today, listen to the voice of the Holy Spirit leading you and guiding you.  As you listen to His voice, allow the beautiful words of Scripture to work in harmony with His leading.  You will be amazed at the change in you.  You will be able to say, like the old hymn says, "How marvelous, how wonderful- and my song shall ever be/ How marvelous, how wonderful is my Savior's love for me!"