while today

Scan the book titles in many preachers’ libraries, and you are likely to run across a commentary by Homer Hailey. Hailey taught at Abilene Christian College (1934-43, 1948-51) and Flordia College (1951-1972). His commentary on the minor prophets was published by Baker Book House in 1972. Christianity Today heralded it as one of 25 most significant books published that year. Hailey also wrote commentaries on Revelation, Isaiah, and the gospel of John.

A biography of Homer Hailey tells his story. Although his family had Restoration Movement roots, he grew up without religious training or going to church. His mother, Mamie, was a baptized believer, but was in a painful marriage. His father, Robert, had problems with drinking and gambling. After his father’s death, Hailey and his brother became the family’s financial support. Still a teenager, he too became involved in smoking, drinking, and gambling. In fact getting beat up one night, while slightly under the influence of White Mule bootleg liquor was one factor that started him in the path of reform.

Mrs. Huffman, wife of Hailey’s employer, had been correcting him and trying to encourage him for the good. Under her influence, he attended church and was later baptized at a “protracted meeting.” Hailey took his new founded faith seriously. He set out to read the Bible on evenings and Sundays. Hailey’s comment about his early Bible reading is the reason for telling the story. Reflecting back on the experience, he said, “I didn’t know what I was reading, but I read it through.”¹

Hailey’s early experience with reading the Bible is common. I think it is important for the beginning Bible reader to hear about the early experiences of an advanced student of the Bible. We may have the mistaken impression that we just aren’t smart enough when we experience difficulties in understanding. We may think that other people understand it easily the first time through. We may get discouraged. The truth is that it takes time. The Bible is a library of books that spans thousands of years of history. We have to take small steps in getting familiar with the names, places, events, and themes.

I felt the same way early in my Bible reading. But even my earliest readings of the Bible registered something. I found moral principles by which to live. It has taken more time to contemplate grace, the holiness of God, and the need for Christ’s death. The deepening of appreciation and understanding never ends. I can assure you that the accumulation of many small steps can take you on a grand journey—a journey of faith. Persistence will pay spiritual dividends. The cry – “I don’t know what I’m reading” – is just the first step.

¹David Edwin Harrell, Jr., The Churches of Christ in the 20th Century: Homer Hailey’s Personal Journey of Faith. (The University of Alabama Press, 2000) p. 32.

I have to admit that I’ve said it. After all, I had read it in some reliable sources. What is this erroneous statement? “Christians divorce at about the same rate as the world.”

Now that doesn’t mean the numbers are good, but a couple of studies suggest that the oft repeated statement that divorce rates for Christians are the same as for outsiders is wrong. Professor Bradley Wright of the University of Connecticut found that 60% had been divorced in the group that rarely attended church versus 38% had been divorced among those that regularly went to church. W. Bradford Wilcox of the University of Virginia found that active conservative Protestants were 35% less likely to divorce than those with no church affiliation and nominally attending conservative Protestants are 20% less likely to divorce than secular Americans.*

It seems that faith does matter in keeping our marriages intact, and it suggests that the stronger our faith the better the results. In other words, just saying we are Christians doesn’t necessarily help. I’m glad for the studies that are correcting the divorce rate myth about Christians. But what is even more important is that faith is the way of correcting the divorce rate!

*http://www.crosswalk.com/family/marriage/divorce-and-remarriage/the-christian-divorce-rate-myth.html

If you stand for Christian values, you will likely hear someone say, “Aren’t you being judgmental?” I like the story of Swami Vivekananda, a Hindu philosopher. He came to the World’s Parliament of Religions in Chicago in 1893. In his address to the delegates, he said, “We [Hindus] accept all religions to be true,” and “[it] is sin to call a man [a sinner].” Of course in making the statement, he himself has called someone a sinner (i.e., the one who calls another a sinner). The charge of being judgmental is always a boomerang.

But what about “Judge not, that you be not judged”? Doesn’t that forbid judging. Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 7:1-6 has three parts. The middle part uses the image of getting a speck out of someone’s eye. The image of getting a speck out of someone’s eye is a way of talking about counseling or confronting someone about sin in his or her life. This isn’t forbidden, but we are first to get the beam out of our own eye. Jesus is concerned about hypocritical judgment.

But what about “Judge not, that you be not judged’? It is indeed a warning about judgment in a section that confirms we will indeed make judgments. What is Jesus’ point? The point is found in the explanation that starts with “for.”

For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you. Matthew 7:2, ESV

Jesus is warning us about unmerciful judgments. If we want mercy from God, then we need to extend mercy to others.

Finally, Jesus warns about uncritical judgment, a failure to evaluate a situation and its dangers. Holy things are not to be given to dogs, and pearls are not to be thrown to pigs, because pigs trample, and dogs attack. Wisdom can know ahead of time how certain things and people will be treated by others. Jesus is warning us of an uncritical judgment in the face of persecutors.

Jesus is not opposed to us making judgments. He is giving us warnings about unmerciful, hypocritical, and uncritical judgments. It is impossible to live the moral life without making judgments.

The charge of being judgmental is always a boomerang, because it too is a judgment. The question in such cases is do we have an agreed upon basis for moral decision making. If we are both Christians, we should in the moral teachings of the Bible. If we don’t have a common basis for morals, then the problem is likely not judgmentalism regardless of the charge, but our competing ways of deciding what is moral. Both of us have the right to attempt to persuade the other, but in the end, if we can’t agree on the basis, we may have to lovingly disagree and await for God, the Judge.

The answer in the traditional wedding vow to this question is “till death do us part.” A few years ago I was reading through some sample wedding vows online and found one that read “till love dies.” That is certainly the vow many people seemingly mean even if it is not the one they promise, and the tabloid news gives us an example of this in one more brief celebrity marriage lasting 72 days. If it were just a matter of celebrities, I’m not sure it would be worth noting, but the evidence around us is that a biblical view of marriage is in trouble.

What is the evidence? The divorce rate for first time marriages is around 40% (it has been as high as 50%). Seventy percent of Americans were married in 1960. Now it is about 50 percent. In the 1960s, two-thirds of twenty year olds were married. Today it is about 26%. What has replaced marriage among young adults is living together. Cohabitation which was once rare is now the norm. Over half of marriages begin with cohabitation, yet couples who cohabit are more likely to divorce. Forty percent of births in the U.S. for 2007 were out of wedlock.

What does God’s word have to say? Here’s a small sampling:

So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate. (Matthew 19:6, ESV)

Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous. (Hebrews 13:4, ESV)

Let me summarize the Bible’s teaching on marriage.

• God designed marriage as the union of one man and one woman. (Genesis 2:18-25, Matthew 19:4-6)
• God desires that marriage be until death do us part. (Matthew 19:6)
• God permits divorce in the case of sexual immorality, but God hates divorce. (Matthew 19:9, Malachi 2:16 see NASB)
• God will judge sexual activity outside of marriage. They are the sexually immoral and adulterous. (Hebrews 13:4)

In today’s world, these verses are like a voice crying in the wilderness. Do we have eyes to see and ears to hear?

I have no interest in the political aspects of this question, and I have no political recommendations for you. I’m interested in the question because I’m fascinated by words and by the media’s inadequacy in dealing with religious questions.

The problem with the question is that the word “cult” has several meanings. I can think of a number of different usages, but only two are germane to the current question. The popular meaning of cult today is a religious group often with a charismatic leader who is authoritarian and uses mind control techniques on his followers. Think Jim Jones and the mass suicide of his followers in Guyana or David Koresh and the Branch Davidians who died in Waco. Is Mormonism a cult in this sense? I think the answer is no.

But there is another definition that is relevant. The late Anthony Hoekema, a former Calvin College professor, wrote a book called The Four Major Cults. The four are Christian Science, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Mormonism, and Seventh Day Adventism. He had a very specialized meaning of cult in mind. His definition is that which is unorthodox and breaks with historic Christianity.¹ The World Christian Encyclopedia is a social science reference book that attempts to classify all Christian denominations, but they break all of them down into six major groupings. One group is “marginal,” and that is where Mormonism is placed. Why marginal? Again, it is because of their break with historic Christian beliefs.

How different is it? Latayne C. Scott is a convert from Mormonism. Her book, The Mormon Mirage, was published 32 years ago by Zondervan and is still in print. When asked whether Mormonism is Christian, she answers with a series of questions.

Do you believe that God the father was once a man and grew to adulthood on another earth and achieved godhood? Do you believe you can become a god or goddess? Do you believe that the Bible is so flawed and in error that it gives Satan power over people who read and believe it? Do you believe that Jesus didn’t keep his promise to protect his church against the gates of hell?²

Mormonism does not believe in God as trinity, but rather the Father Son, and Holy Spirit are three gods. Doctrines and Covenants teaches that the Father has a body of flesh and blood (130:22). Human beings have the potential of becoming a god. Mormons have a wonderful emphasis on family and a notable missionary zeal, but they frequently use Bible terms with entirely different meanings. Are they a cult in the sense that they break with historic Christian teaching? The answer is yes.

¹Anthony Hoekema, The Four Major Cults, p. 374

²http://www.christianchronicle.org/article2159446~A_conversation_with_Latayne_C._Scott

The cross is at the center of the Christian message. Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified (1 Corinthians 2:2, ESV). Why was Paul so centered on the cross? Because the message of the cross is the power of God for salvation (1 Cor. 1:18). The cross is God’s means of reconciling the world to Himself (Eph. 2:16, Col. 1:20). On the cross, Jesus became the sacrifice for our sins.

The cross is also at the center of our conversion. Even during his earthly ministry, Jesus said, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me” (Mark 8:34, ESV). In the first century world, to take up your cross was to die. Luke’s account adds the word, “daily,” making clear that Jesus is speaking figuratively (Luke 9:23). Jesus demands that we die to ourselves, to our old lives.

This same imagery is associated with baptism. Paul wrote, “Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life” (Romans 6:3-4, ESV). The Christian also has a cross, a tomb, and an empty tomb. We die to ourselves, and we are also united to Christ. The watery grave of baptism connects us to Jesus’ death and burial. We are resurrected from the waters of baptism to newness of life. There is a new life to be experienced now because we are united to Christ, and there is the hope of resurrection when He comes again.

The cross is at the center of Christian living. The new life has power. We are forgiven of our sins in the past, but we are also transformed. Paul wrote, “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (Galatians 2:20, ESV). Later in the same letter, Paul explained, “But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world” (Galatians 6:14, ESV). Connected to Christ we can live better than we can with our own efforts alone.

The cross teaches me that I’m loved because Jesus endured the cross to save sinners like me. Jesus paid my debt on the cross. But the cross demands a response. Jesus asks me to die to myself. In baptism, my status before God is changed. I become united to Christ. My sins are forgiven, and I become a part of the people of God. The cross-centered life also gives power for living. In dying to myself and letting Christ live in me, I find the strength to be transformed. With Christ, I can do things I could not do alone.

Are you living a cross centered life?