Musings: Notes From My Daybook

Will and I are in Wilmore, Kentucky for a couple of days. We arrived yesterday evening and were able to meet dear friends--the Bushes (Doug, Alice, Meredith) for dinner. Then on to Asbury College--the purpose of our trip. Will is considering Asbury as a possible distination as he finishes high school.

It is always inspiring to be on a college campus and Asbury is no different. And the memories went flooding through my mind. As I dropped off Will at Trustee Hall I suddenly realized that he was about to get inevitable introduction to college life that sets up all kinds of memories--the men's dorms! I also realized that I have many stories about dorm life that I must still keep at bay. I'm afraid that if I told him now it would only encourage what comes most naturally.

Presently, I am pleasantly sitting in the library at Asbury Theological Seminary, enjoying the smell of books and the pleasure of sun streaming onto the sturdy wooden tables that every library should have.

Asbury recently received a Lilly Endowment grant to explore the integration of faith and learning. It is the same sort of grant that Pepperdine University received and is using to explore the notion of vocation.

So in light of that, I close with a quote from C. S. Lewis (Learning in War-Time)where Lewis remarks about work as seen in light of our faith:
"All of our activities will be accepted, if they are offered to God, even the humblest; and all of them, even the noblest, will be sinful if they are not. . . . The work of a Beethoven and the work of a charwoman becomes spiritual on precisely the same condition, that of being offered to God, of being done humbly 'as to the Lord.' This does not, of course, mean that it is for anyone a mere toss-up whether he should sweep rooms or compose symphonies. A mole must dig to the glory of God, and a cock must crow. We are member of one body, but differentiated members, each with his own vocation."

. . . . whatever you do, do to the glory of God!

Film maker Brian Flemming recently released a documentary about Jesus called The God Who Wasn't There. As an independent artist, the film has no distribution program other than word of mouth. However, it is getting some attention in various cities.

Flemming's basic point is that Jesus never existed, that the apostle Paul, writing 30 years later than the proported messiah, apparently made up a figure that played into his writing to various churches. According to to the website, the film will demonstrate that the founders of Christianity knew nothing of a human Jesus.

Hmmmm, I think I've heard this one before (think 1,2, and 3 John).

Most of the psuedo-scholars that Flemming puts up on his website read more like an atheist's who's who, than someone who is actually trained in history. But I must say that I want to see the movie. In fact, I've just ordered my own copy, which, according to the website, I can show publicly and charge admission!

Why would I spend $25?

The thing that I find most interesting about Flemming's work is his conviction that Christians don't really know their stuff. In a quote in yesterday's Kansas City Star, Flemming said: "They say the Bible guides their lives, but they know nothing about how the Bible was created, how those books were chosen to be part of the Bible. Their ignorance of some very basic history is incredible. Almost nothing makes less sense than your average Christian explaining Christianity."

Whether Flemming has anything truthful to have to wait until I see the movie. However, I know that his assertion that Christians are woefully ignorant is painfully true. Flemming and his ilk are growing; revisionist history is a flourishing pasttime (think of Dan Brown and the Da Vinci Code). And much that passes for North American Christianity is really just whatever we have been handed by culture and by our churches.

That isn't necessarily bad. But I can assure you, it isn't enough. If the Christian message is going to have something to say to the pagan, pluralistic culture of North America, then we had better get serious about history, about theology, and about the practice of Christian community.

I don't think I will eat popcorn while I watch this one.

Thanks to Brian for the lead on the following New York Times piece on evangelicals and the environment. Apparently the National Association of Evangelicals, no small organization is preparing a statement on environmentalism--in particular, on the control on carbon emissions. This document, rooted in the biblical tradition of creation and the charge that the Creator gave to humankind to protect and care for the earth, has received some interesting responses.

For traditional environmentalists, they are pleased to welcome the influence of the perhaps 30 million people who are associated with the NAE. Anything to help sway Congress on matters of the earth. But what I find more interesting, and disappointing, is the response of some senators. James M. Inhofe, an Oklahoma Republican who is also chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, has taken a rather dim view of the statement. The interesting thing is that Inhofe is described as an evangelical.

Politically, Inhofe has taken a rather conservative position on environmentalism. That, in and of itself, is not all that significant. What I do find significant is the way in which he is responding to the NAE. "You can always find in Scriptures a passage to misquote for almost anything," Mr. Inhofe said in an recent interview. Evangelicalism for the past 50 years has been talking about the idea of creation and humankind's divine mandate for the care of the earth. Of note is this quote from the Times article: "He said the National Evangelical Association had been "led down a liberal path" by environmentalists and others who have convinced the group that issues like poverty and the environment are worth their efforts." Frankly, Inhofe's remarks show a remarkable ignorance of the biblical record.

The work of Craig Blomberg or Ron Sider, noted evangelical scholars, on poverty and the Evangelical Environmental Network on environmental issues are rather clear and substantive. One may certainly disagree about all the politics involved, but it seems that Christians who take the witness of Scripture seriously would be prepared to think deeply about matters the environment or poverty or "fill in the blank" through the lens of Scripture, not on a particular political agenda.