I had a look at this blog a day or two ago and found a comment from Mitch on my post “Love for Sinners?”.  It simply said, “I disagree”, followed by a link to a post Mitch wrote on his own blog. I’ve decided to answer that post here.

Dear Mitch,

Thanks for your comment. I’ve had a quick read of your post and thought I’d respond to what I think are the salient points. If you think I’ve missed something, feel free to let me know. But a couple of things before we start.

1. Your post responds directly to the Francis Chan video; my post responds to issues that video raised around the blogosphere. They therefore overlap to a huge degree, but are also different. It might be worthwhile for both of us to keep that in mind.
2. I hold to the five points of Calvinism. I do not deny any of the affirmations of God’s sovereignty that you have in your post. In fact, I’m even more conservative than many Calvinists in that I am a determinist! So, don’t take this response as a repudiation of God’s sovereignty, but rather an affirmation of God’s love for sinners. The two are not mutually exclusive.

So, on with it. I think you’ve made a mistake common to all of us i.e. unconsciously putting our theological system above what the Bible actually says. But I’m assuming you are also open to discussion as long as disagreements are biblically based. That’s what I will attempt to do here – present an argument from the Bible that God does love sinners in a way that you are denying. Continue Reading »

In this first dialogue, the two participants in the dialogues are introduced.  Eusebius visits Theophilus with the express intention to get advice about Experience Meetings. This first dialogue gives an imaginary history of the awakening in Eusebius’ area, though one can imagine that the history is a compilation of similar histories throughout Wales.

Eusebius outlines a situation where only a few faithful Christians gathered together for prayer, not because of any fervor on their part, but purely because the Bible promised that wherever two or three are gathered in Jesus’ name he would be there to bless. Even so, their meetings were “lifeless”, a description emphasized seemingly because the Experience Meetings to be discussed were anything but. According to Eusebius’ history, they finally decided to no longer meet, but at their last meeting, the most timid and unbelieving of them suddenly began to pray with passion, speaking “unusual words” as if in agony of soul. This state of mind spread to everyone else who was there and they all “laid hold upon God, His attributes, His Word and His promises, resolving that we would never let go our hold until all our desire should be satisfied.”

And God came. Continue Reading »

Dr. David Martin Lloyd-Jones begins by placing the book in the context in which it was written, “The Methodist or Evangelical Awakening of the 18^th Century”. Apparently the Awakening began in Wales about two years before England, but both had great similarities, the greatest being the rising of little groups meeting outside of normal service times “for further teaching and nurturing in the Faith”. The object, according to Lloyd-Jones, “was primarily to provide a fellowship in which the new spiritual life and experience of the people could be safe-guarded and developed” due to the deadness of the Churches. Experience and experiential knowledge of God’s love and ways was the goal; teaching and bible study and “intellectual aspects of the Faith” were left for preaching services and other times.

The meetings themselves consisted of sharing what God was doing in each person’s life and what sins and difficulties they were facing. “Here, the emphasis was on daily life and living, the fight against the world, the flesh and the devil, and the problems that arise inevitably in the Christian’s pilgrimage through this world of sin.”

Lloyd-Jones then introduces the writer, William Williams, Continue Reading »

No profundity.  (That’s profundity, not profanity!)  Just a hello, hope you have a good Christmas celebration with whoever you have a Christmas celebration with.  There will be no internet access where we are going, so this is goodbye for a time and all the best in Jesus.

Alistair and Paula…well, it would be Paula if she knew I was writing this.

I’ve decided to blog through a small book called, “The Experience Meeting: An Introduction to the Welsh Societies of the Evangelical Awakening” by William Williams. The reason for this is that these meetings were clearly Spirit-initiated and in many ways developed to meet some of the goals outlined in Spirit-inspired Scripture for the meetings of the earliest Christian community. My intention is to see if the experience of the Welsh Christians during the evangelical awakening gives a broader background upon which to set 1 Corinthians 11-14 and, perhaps, to fill in some gaps in our knowledge.

It is important to note that neither the author nor Dr. D. Martin Lloyd-Jones, who writes the introduction, consider these meetings to be examples of 1 Corinthians 11-14. This will become clear as we progress through the book. However, I do not think that their disagreement with me in this area means that the Spirits activity cannot be correctly understood in ways that they did not.

So, the book.

It was originally written in Welsh and was translated by the wife of Dr. Lloyd-Jones with an introduction by the Doctor himself. It is short – 62 pages – and divided into seven dialogues between two men called Theophilus and Eusebius. (As a side note, my wife wants to call one of our children Theophilus Bartholemew. Apparently barristers need long names like that! I keep telling her that no one really cares about the name of the guy who makes their coffee.) The English is old and the characters sound like pompous spiros (spiritual show-offs) unless you read it with a Welsh accent. Then it sounds perfect. The form is not user-friendly to lazy modern readers like me who like to have everything laid out very clearly, but neither is it really difficult to grasp the content once you decide to make a bit of effort and persevere.

One of the great advantages of this book is that it comes straight from an author who experienced a move of the Spirit of God in his circles for years on end. The result is that we have a maturity that has sifted the initial enthusiasm of a revival and can speak with some authority on what is actually beneficial, what is mere enthusiasm and what is harmful. It is rare, in my experience, to have a book with that maturity that describes the means by which Christian experience can be maintained through a community rather than individually. Whether anyone agrees or disagrees with my comparisons with New Testament Christian meetings, this is a valuable and challenging resource for anyone who wants to learn how to truly meet with others and have iron sharpen iron.

Finally, we got the Simpson Movie out on DVD last night.

Gotta love that Spiderpig song!

And the theme music written using it later in the movie. Classic.

1 Corinthians 15:3-8

3 For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, 4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures,
5 and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. 6 Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. 7 Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. 8 Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me.

Earth-shattering! There is news that comes along once or twice in a generation that reaches into every part of a nation, a culture or the globe, and changes the way people understand the world. Years later you can ask, “How did you hear about the death of Princess Di, the attack on the Twin Towers, the fall of the Berlin Wall?” and they will tell you where they were, who they were with and a thousand other details, unimportant except that they made up the last moment of a world that suddenly changed. They think differently, they act differently, they live differently than they did before – all because of that earth-shattering news.

It’s one of those kind of events that Paul, the writer of the above verses, is talking about:

“Christ died for our sins…he was buried…he was raised on the third day…”.

Paul was not there. This is news that he himself heard and is passing on. It’s news that has happened in our world independent of both him and us. He’s a reporter, a news desk reader, a guy writing copy for a newspaper or leaving a message on your Facebook wall. We can’t change it. It happened and our world will never be the same.

When Princess Di was killed in a car crash, swathes of people suffered a phenomenal amount of grief, some even taking time off work to deal with her passing. Others were not personally affected at all. Everyone, however, understood the immensity of the news.

When the Berlin Wall came down a huge number of lives were changed as Western companies, commodities and culture flooded East Germany and the Communist Bloc. Others, living in the West, felt far less personal and dramatic change, if any change at all. Yet all recognised the shift in the balance of world power.

When the Twin Towers came down in New York on September 11, 2001, people the world over felt shocked and fearful and violated by the successful attack on the most powerful country in the world. Others rejoiced. Everyone recognised that an epoch making event had occurred.

Jesus Christ died for our sins, was buried and was raised on the third day. Millions of people have taken hold of that victory over sin and death and lived changed lives in light of it. Others have rejected it. Everyone realises the immense change that has followed it. Whatever you do, that event remains of first importance.

Most of my favourite speakers vow and declare preaching is the key to a successful God-honouring Church.  Tim Keller says we are to preach good news, not good advice.  And the truth is, those Churches with a strong pulpit do incredibly well in our culture.  But where is preaching the centre of the Church meeting in the Bible?  You see, that’s my problem.  It’s not there.

Turns out Rob Bell is a great speaker.  I’ve listened to him two or three times and yes, he is really engaging (though I haven’t made it a practice to go back and listen to him more than that).  He is on a speaking tour called, “The Gods Aren’t Angry” and is drawing sell-out crowds.  A man with obviously incredible gifts and creativity.

But the content of the message is a slight deviation from the gospel message.  According to reports (and apparently the title of tour) God did not send Jesus to turn away his wrath from sinful mankind, but instead sent Jesus to correct our misunderstanding - God is not angry with us, and when we understand that we are free to live the lives he intends us to live.

Umm, not the gospel.  Sure, God loves us and is simultaneously angry enough to condemn us.  To deny God’s anger is to deny the gospel.  Yes, there are many other aspects to the gospel, but to specifically say God is not angry creates an heretical message.

I appreciate Rob Bell’s gifts and his apparent heart, but his message needs to be called out.  Not gospel.  Heresy.