call me pasturescott

Dear Church, Your Problem Isn’t With Caitlyn

1 Corinthians 5:12,13
For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge? God judges those outside…

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Acts 17:30-31
“God…has set a day when the entire human race will be judged and everything set right. And he has already appointed the judge, confirming him before everyone by raising him from the dead.”

Once upon a time I fancied myself on the order of ‘tell ’em like it is’ Isaiah or a hair-pulling Nehemiah or Day-of-the-Lord-Joel. There’s certainly nothing wrong with these approaches – if that’s what God has called you to do. Dare I even say, having an anointing for it.

For a large portion of my traveling ministry I bristled at the term ‘evangelist’, informing pastors straightaway my calling is to the church, not the lost and outside. I cozied up much better to ‘revival speaker’ as I believed my purpose was best utilized for lighting a fire under the church.

God certainly has His evangelists and prophets, but how quickly had I forgotten His mission for me, spelled out in a thought-conversation between us as I lay broken-back paralyzed on a hospital bed in 1981? In a flow of revelation, I heard the kindness of God speak to my wondering mind:

Scott (we’re on a first-name basis), My Church is filled with broken people and I want you to share My message of hope and grace to My hurting remnant.”

But what title goes with that? What office of the Church is this? How do pastors introduce me? Encourager? Healer?

(I dunno, how about – just spitballin’ here – “Scott”; I mean, that’s what my Father calls me…)

All that to say this: I get it. Perhaps 20 or 30 years later, but I understand. I’m an encourager. That’s how God uses me. It can sometimes cross over into exhorter, but always in a spirit of encouragement. God has His prophets, but that’s not really my gig.

So when I write posts like this, I know I’m taking a risk. I realize I’m playing with Ezekiel’s fire, so I’ll do so ever so cautiously, and, trust me, by the end you’ll see more of my encouragement resurface.

Still, I feel compelled. Not by Scott Mitchell but by the Spirit of Christ who called me to preach the Good News of liberation (God used Isaiah 61:1,2 to bring me to my teen-aged senses). Inherent in my calling to encourage the Body is my own hope to see the church set free.

So first, if you haven’t already, go back to the top and read those lead-in scriptures. I’ll wait for you back here.

(Pause)

Wait. Don’t jump on the bandwagon of “Christians shouldn’t judge” and fly this flag as its emblem. Nossir. That’s not what Paul is saying.

Of course we’re supposed to judge! Only, we must never judge in the sense of writing somebody off or sending them to their doom with ‘wiping hands clean’ hearts. Matthew 7:1 has to be balanced against Matthew 7:16 and John 7:24. Our judging must be filtered through the lens of humility and tempered by the love of Christ.

And…according to these and many other scriptures, Christians are supposed to judge.

Other Christians.

God has given the church the mandate to judge itself – albeit righteously and mercifully (see Gal 6:1-ff).

And that’s what I’m doing here. I’m posting this blog to say ‘brethren, we’re in sad shape and may God heal us of all our diseases.‘

Frankly, we’re so sick we shouldn’t have a lot of extra time snorting and harrumphing on Facebook, demeaning the sins of others; others, of course, being those outside the faith.

I’m choosing not to join the fray on these matters and others that appear to be blowing up my timelines on Twitter and Facebook. The fact I’m not joining in isn’t out of cowardice (I know where I stand, I just don’t have weapons in my hands while doing it) but because I’m waiting for the church to be just as angry about its own sin instead of focusing on those glaring offenses blitzing our social mediums.

Those matters are ‘Adam behaving like Adam’. It’s what unredeemed Adam does. (Okay, understand I’m not talking about violence and criminal activity in this post – there are necessary repercussions for these)

I could talk all day about the many offenses of the church in our time but I’m choosing to only name three. Only three. Three biggies, mind you, but just these three…for starters.

If the church could repent of just these three, I believe the world would be in a much different place. Oh, the unbelieving world that chooses to remain in its unbelief will still be well on its way to hell, but if these three things could be dealt with, my my my, what a difference there could be.

But I’m warning you, they’re big. I mean mountainous. No, mountain range-ous. I’m talking Swiss Alps here.

Here they are:

1. SELF-RIGHTEOUSNESS

It seems fairly obvious to me we like to point out the big foibles of others’ lives so we don’t have to look at our own damning issues.

When I see hateful, hurtful posts spewing venom at the unredeemed by professing believers, I’m wont to ask, so how’s that lying problem of yours? Jesus said liars and hypocrites won’t inherit the Kingdom of heaven. Are you loving your wife as Christ loves His Bride, or thinking it’s just a suggestion? Have you lusted on the internet recently? Any person for whom you’re harboring unforgiveness?

Hear me: I’m not leaving myself out of the mix. I’m well aware of the thoughts I can think and the emotions as judge, jury, and executioner I can call up in a heartbeat. I’m simply making a plea for self-examination, for falling on the mercy of Jesus once we’ve each had a long, hard look at the man in the mirror. If we’ve been forgiven much, we’ll love much, Jesus said.

2. DIVISIVENESS

How silly is it that we feel we have any authority at all to morally legislate the behaviors of those outside the faith, when we can’t even get along inside the household of faith? Are you kidding me?

38 THOUSAND denominations in Christianity today? 38 maybe, but 3-8-comma-and-3-zeros? That’s 38,000 times a group has splintered off another group – often (not always, I realize) out of unyieldedness, stubbornness, selfish ambition, heavy-handedness, unfixable divides, and bearing grudges instead of bearing with one another.

I’m not even going to go into all the splinterings and splits within churches of the same denomination!

Jesus prayed that His people would be one (John 17:23,24). My spiritual father calls this “the most evangelistic prayer ever prayed” because Jesus said its answer would result in the world seeing Christ on earth, in full display, and “believe” (v21).

Maybe, just maybe, there would be less Caitlyns if only they would see more of the beautifulness (it’s possibly a word) of Jesus and His life on display among His followers.

Please, let us dream.

3. LUKEWARMNESS

This speaks to lukewarm love; yes, for Christ, certainly, but a tepid love for others, both the fallen & lost, and the wayward & scandalized. Jesus forecasted a cooling of love in the last days (Matthew 24:12), moving into cold-heartedness. I think He knew it would also be so among His so-called followers, regretfully.

Where is the love for the lost? Where is gracious compassion for the impenitent? Why the vitriol for sinners? Why the hatred and Pharisaic disgust for the unclean? Have we forgotten how once we were so far off, despising God and His reign, shaking our fist at heaven … and yet … and yet … “God [showed] His love for us while we were yet sinners…”???

We can’t blame the gays on any of these sins of the church. We can’t point a finger at Hollywood or the Democratic Party or Obama or Hillary Clinton or the Supreme Court for our slide and failures.

Merciful Jesus, in G.K. Chesterton style, I say in answer to the query of “what’s wrong with the world?” a resounding, “I am.”

I am…

Dear Church, no finger-pointing here.

I’m a self-righteous Pharisee at times. I snort at the sinner and glad-hand myself for my straight-arrow walk. Foolish am I.

I can be divisive – perhaps not openly so, but in my heart I can grumble about another who has better gifts than I minister with, and I can gossip in the name of Jesus – even if it’s *only* to my spouse, thus coloring her opinion thence onward. Ragamuffin am I.

I have a flagging love for others. I can choose to walk around a dirty street person every once in awhile so as not to be bothered whilst on my alternative mission, or sigh when I see “that person” calling or texting me again, and what can they possibly need now … or … why can’t they just get over their stuff???

Jerk am I.

I’m not immune any more than you are, but I know this: the same Jesus that loved me in spite of my hatred of Him before I mercifully saw the Light, loves me still, in spite of these confessions, and He’s not writing me off.

I’m making it my heart’s pledge to never do that to anybody, either. I’m going to believe that Caitlyn Jenner is loved by God and the broken places that no surgery can fix can be mercifully touched and transformed (not transgendered) by His love. Snarkiness never won nobody to Jesus. I’m believing Tony Campolo is my brother and I can see past our disagreements to a man (like me) still on his way to fullness and find the Jesus in him. (To hear some tell it, he’s already been ascribed to hell.) Same with the Duggars or Rob Bell. Or the pope. And the LGBT community. And ____________ (insert politician’s name here).

Is it easy? Was it “easy” for God to love me in my darkest rebellion? Remember: He still came looking for Adam when He knew what the rascal’d done. That’s my mandate. Never give up, never let go, never write off, never condemn, never stop loving. Tears, backstabs, betrayals, sleepless nights, anger, good news, bad news, relapses (give me grace, God), roller coasters, merry-go-rounds…

But hey, sounds a lot like my résumé, past and present. Thank God He didn’t – and doesn’t – hate me all over social media. I guess I’m saying, He, the Founder of the Church, treats people a lot better than the church does. We can do better. By the mercy of Christ Who fills His Church…we can do better. So let’s.

Worst Of Times, Best Of Times

Being called to a life of ‘abnormal’ suffering has taught me a few things. For one, my rear-view perspective tends to run rose-hued, as I harbor a near-romantic blush, a satisfying kinship, with past seasons in the Refiner’s Fire.

Mr. Spurgeon, no stranger to dark days himself (he suffered lifelong bouts with depression), wrote and spoke often on the nature of suffering’s grander good.

Take this, for example. Here, he adds an epistolary of hope to the chronicles of the suffering Church and hits the proverbial nail square with typical eloquence and heart:

* * * *

“I bear my witness that the worst days I have ever had have turned out to be my best days. And when God has seemed most cruel to me he has then been most kind. If there is anything in this world for which I would bless him more than for anything else it is for pain and affliction. I am sure that in these things the richest tenderest love has been manifested to me.

Our Father’s wagons rumble most heavily when they are bringing us the richest freight of the bullion of his grace. Love letters from heaven are often sent in black-edged envelopes. The cloud that is black with horror is big with mercy.

Fear not the storm. It brings healing in its wings and when Jesus is with you in the vessel the tempest only hastens the ship to its desired haven.”

– Charles H. Spurgeon

How about you, friend? Do you bear witness to these things also?

Before You Walk Away From Church For Good

Pew Research says the Church in America is dying.¹

Barna, in an earlier research project, says kids (and what demographic adds more life to the church?) are leaving the church in droves, starting at age 15.²

Lifeway Research says they’re not leaving for good, but they’re definitely on hiatus.³

Rachel Held Evans’ best-seller, Searching For Sunday, gives a millennial voice to an entire generation of young church-leavers.⁴

I’ve read RHE’s book and found it fascinating, actually. So much in it resonated with me. Before I ever knew Rachel’s story I was already in the mode of moving from contemporary-for-the-sake-of-relevance liturgy to a more ancient or apostolic liturgy. The symbols of the sacraments were no longer just that to my seeking heart. They have become a deeper reality, a more meaningful expression of community worship. They are alive and effectual. Churches I’ve grown up in treated baptism and the Lord’s Table with the same passion as a quarterly church business meeting – which is the frequency by which they were observed, sadly. No, I’m not looking for robes and mitres and censers. But I’d like less emphasis on the band, the preacher’s hipness, the synchronized lights and (in some cases) the fog machine.

Don’t get me wrong. This isn’t a diatribe against contemporariness (if that’s a word; auto-correct doesn’t think so). I’m just aching for something closer to the root of our apostolic faith, not dangling out on the end of some flimsy branch.

Barely a chapter in, I was already tweeting Rachel and thanked her for her reverent treatment of the sacrament of baptism. I verbalized that she and I might differ on some other matters (which we do, most assuredly), but she’s my sister and I celebrate her. This may be neither here nor there, but she replied to my tweet. Graciously. And she has at other times too. It speaks well of a well-known personality that they would respond to a lesser-known nobody like me. I’ve found it rare on social media.

But, I’m off topic. We’re talking about you, not me.

So you’re fed up with church. You’re moving dangerously in the direction of thinking you can get on without her. Think again.

Oh, I get your angst. I know when you do the whole church, steeple, open the doors and wiggle your fingers thing, everything up to the fingers is okay. It’s the people that stop you in your tracks. Yes, churches contain mean people, judgmental people, hypocrisy and opulence at the expense of your community’s poor. No argument here.

Modern church experience can be akin to the “before” picture of a weight-loss ad. Nothing to get excited about there; more to be disgusted with to be sure. But give it time. If your only church experience has been a “before” picture, switch magazines – or gyms! But you yourself need the running track, the ellipticals, the Zumba class, and the stair master too.

Why? Because you’re a walking “before” advertisement also.

Don’t leave the church. For all her faults, she is still the receptacle and conduit of hope and truth to the fallen world. For the love of all that’s good and holy, find a thriving community of faith and cleave to it, whatever expression. Just make sure the sacraments and elements of Acts 2:42 (and baptism!) are in play there.

Let me close out this post with some articulate thoughts from Barbara Brown Taylor which Rachel Held Evans uses to close out her highly readable book. Okay, okay, settle down. Easy now. I make no apologies for quoting from two progressively-inclined women in Christianity. They are my/our sisters (which makes me happy) and both make helpful points here. Barbara first:

Whether you are sick or well, lovely or irregular, there comes a time when it is vitally important to your spiritual health to drop your clothes, look in the mirror, and say, ‘Here I am. This is the body-like-no-other that my life has shaped. I live here. This is my soul’s address. After you have taken a good look around, you may decide that there is a lot to be thankful for, all things considered. Bodies take real beatings. That they heal from most things is an underrated miracle. That they give birth is beyond reckoning.
When I do this, I generally decide that it is time to do a better job of wearing my skin with gratitude instead of loathing.⁵

After which RHE flips the mirror:

This is the church. Here she is. Lovely, irregular, sometimes sick and sometimes well. This is the body-like-no-other that God has shaped and placed in the world. Jesus lives here; this is his soul’s address. There is a lot to be thankful for, all things considered. She has taken a beating, the church. Every day she meets the gates of hell and she prevails. Every day she serves, stumbles, injures, and repairs. That she has healed is an underrated miracle. That she gives birth is beyond reckoning. Maybe it’s time to make peace with her. Maybe its time to embrace her, flawed as she is.⁶

Let’s stem the tide of the recent exodus. Let’s quell the statistics. It’s the way of Jesus to give room, bear up with one another. Do I have stories? I was a pastor, remember?

I could tell you of the time an interracial couple left our church, loudly accusing my wife of racism because she didn’t give their son a solo in the children’s program – when he’d only joined weeks before (it was written, explained and understood by all that a child had to be a part of the choir for at least six months before getting an up-front part). Sandy went to their home to humble herself before them, but no matter. They saw only what they wanted to see and marred a gentle woman’s servant influence.

I could tell you of the woman who was healed of her cancer but through a series of misperceptions, left the church with a final curse of, “this church’ll close its doors a year after we’re gone.” That was years ago and the fellowship still faithfully gathers.

I could…no, I won’t. If I let it, these botherings would define the church for me. But I know different. These were the exceptions, not the standards. For every harsh punch-to-the-gut my wife and I have experienced, we are the undeserving recipients of exponential graces and blessings from our extended church family. Church is a family you choose, every week. Week after week. You put up with it, it puts up with you. And you both are better for it. Together.

So, friend, before you go for good, turn around and look again. You think it’s risky to stay? I tell you, it’s far more dangerous out there, on your own. Don’t go. You’re not alone. Stay and give beauty a chance to grow out of the ash pile.

¹http://www.pewforum.org/2015/05/12/americas-changing-religious-landscape/

²https://www.barna.org/teens-next-gen-articles/528-six-reasons-young-christians-leave-church

³ http://www.christianitytoday.com/edstetzer/2014/may/dropouts-and-disciples-how-many-students-are-really-leaving.html

⁴ http://rachelheldevans.com/blog/searching-for-sunday-excerpt-body

⁵ An Altar In The World, Barbara Brown Taylor, pp37-8

⁶ Searching For Sunday, Rachel Held Evans, p168