Will You Boldly Contend?

Last week, I was deeply saddened to learn of the celebration of the first openly gay bishop's election to leadership in the United Methodist Church.

I sat down on a green-painted wooden bench on a camp meeting campus recently.  I introduced myself, and found I was speaking to an 88 year old retired United Methodist minister.  We began chatting about the recent developments in the denomination to which he has given his life in ministry.  Very quickly I discerned his position. I was astonished when this balding, stooped elderly clergyman said, "We have to rethink our position on human sexuality." Our conversation was cut short by the expected arrival of a friend. 

I have reflected upon that conversation, the condition of the church of Jesus Christ, the nation, and the movement that birthed my faith. I have wondered how I can boldly contend for the faith in a culture where our conversations all too often become contentious. 

Anger seems to define our discourse in America. Reactive anger will not advance a Biblical agenda. Anger will not advance a call to holiness. Anger will simply afford media an opportunity to label the angry as haters, not holy. I want a bold courage, filled with perfect love, from which I contend for faith in Jesus Christ with a passion for lost people to be converted, and Christ's church to be made holy. Bold courage and self-giving love is Christ's mandate to us.

I recently read of Dr. Oliveto's appointment to the position of bishop in the Western Jurisdictional Conference of the United Methodist Church. Rev. Dr. Karen Oliveto served as senior pastor of Glide Memorial United Methodist Church in San Francisco, California. The church website describes Dr. Oliveto's professional journey.

"Originally from Long Island, NY, Karen Oliveto has been a campus and parish minister in rural and urban settings in New York and California. She arrived in San Francisco in 1989, first as campus minister at San Francisco State University, and then, in 1992, as the pastor and leader of Bethany United Methodist Church in Noe Valley. While there, she expanded the congregation, and was instrumental in the effort to open the doors of the United Methodist Church to all persons, including gays and lesbians and their families. Oliveto holds a Ph.D. in Religion and Society from Drew University, and recently served as the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs at Pacific School of Religion where she continues as adjunct professor of United Methodist Studies. She is also an adjunct professor at Drew University’s Doctor of Ministry program." http://www.glide.org/pastors

Dr. J. C. McPheeters was pastor of Glide Memorial Methodist Church in San Francisco, California from 1930 to 1948. He also served as President of Asbury Theological Seminary from 1942 to 1962. 

I chatted recently with Dr. Timothy Tennent, current President of Asbury Theological Seminary, in Wilmore, KY.  Dr. Tennent was speaking at a historically Methodist camp meeting in Georgia. I was visiting there for a few days, representing Wesley Biblical Seminary, where I serve as President. 

Dr. Tennent told me that in the first 6 years of Dr. McPheeters presidency at Asbury Theological Seminary, he continued as pastor of Glide Memorial Methodist Church in San Francisco.  Dr. McPheeters was provided with a Buick in which he traversed the United States of America. Along the way, McPheeters made many friends for Asbury Theological Seminary. Dr. Tennent told me that he still visits that scattered western circuit of friends along the well-traveled paths of his predecessor. 

When I heard the breaking news of the Oliveto election, I recognized the name, Glide Memorial United Methodist Church; however, it took me a few days to realized how much the Glide name had already impacted my life.  I have to tell you my story, in order to make my point.

Beth and I courted for 3 years before we married, our last year of courtship was our first year at Asbury College, Wilmore, Kentucky.  When we enrolled at Asbury, Beth moved into Glide-Crawford Hall. Lizzie Glide was the sanctified Methodist benefactor who established this dormitory for women at Asbury College in 1921. She was the same Lizzie Glide who had established Glide Memorial Methodist Church in San Francisco in 1929. http://wc.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=ggsnider&id=I0134

I grew up in the home mission work of the Kentucky Mountain Holiness Association, a ministry of churches in schools in Eastern Kentucky. Rev. Lela G. McConnell founded the Kentucky Mountain Holiness Association in 1924. McConnell graduated from Asbury College on June 2, 1924 at the age of 40. Dr. Henry Clay Morrison's commencement commission was still ringing in her ears when she boarded the train in Nicholasville, bound for Jackson, Kentucky: "I give this diploma to the general of the Kentucky mountains."  

Bound by the Holy Spirit and a divine call from God, Dr. McConnell accepted the challenge of a frontier ministry in the foothills of the Appalachians. "But the mountain shall be thine; for it is a wood, and thou shalt cut it down: and the outgoings of it shall be thine: for thou shalt drive out the Canaanites, though they have iron chariots, and though they be strong" (Joshua 17:18). She established a legacy that lives today.

In 1949, my father, John Eldon Neihof, Sr., enrolled at Dr. McConnell's Mount Carmel High School as a freshman. He graduated from Mount Carmel (1953) and her sister institution, Kentucky Mountain Bible Institute (1956). My mother, Agnes Creed Neihof, enrolled as a junior at Mount Carmel in 1951. These young sweethearts completed their studies together and in 1956 enrolled at Asbury College. Upon completion of their studies, they returned to the Kentucky Mountain Holiness Association as home missionaries in January, 1959, spending their entire adult lives in ministry there, first at Mount Carmel High School and Church, then at Kentucky Mountain Bible College. Dad eventually succeeded to the presidency of the KMHA and served in that role from 1981 to 2003.

Rev. Rex Bullock is a lifelong friend and minister with the Free Methodist Church. Rex told me a story of working in a conference with Dr. J.C. McPheeters, early in his ministry. He wrote: "John, I shall never forget that some years ago I preached a conference with Dr J.C. McPheeters and he told of the many years he pastored Glide Memorial. He said that for 17 years straight he had Miss McConnell come to hold revivals and preach holiness. I was stunned because I pastored in Santa Cruz, CA and knew that Glide was the #1 gay church in the U.S. at that time. Now the first openly gay bishop comes from there. What a progression."

My eighty-one year old father remembers Dr. McPheeters speaking at Kentucky Mountain Bible College during his student days. Dad has often told me the story of a spry McPheeters, age 90, water-skiing! Dad also recalls Dr. McConnell's friendship with Dr. McPheeters, remembering her having preached for him at Glide Memorial Methodist Church. 

The ripple effect of a theology that undermines Scripture, excuses sin, promotes sinful lifestyles, and celebrates a departure and redefining of holiness effects my life.  But it effects your life, too.  

Lizzie Glide was a sanctified lady. McPheeters was a holiness preacher. McConnell's holy life and influence formed me profoundly. My entire spiritual experience was formed by people whose legacy has been destroyed. But not altogether. Not if that legacy lives in you and me.

I will contend for holiness, but in spite of the sorrow and anger I feel for what has been lost, I will not be contentious. Anger and contentiousness is not winsome, attractive or appealing in preaching, teaching, and seeking to exemplify Christ's holiness. Bold, courageous and confident exposition of Scripture, relevant cultural analysis, and Biblical application to gritty real-life issues point our path forward. I will love people caught in sin's grip, and take them by the hand to lead them to Christ, His wholeness, and His holiness. I will boldly contend!

"Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints." Jude 1:3

Citizenship: Living with Tension

http://www.afa.net/the-stand/church/2016/07/citizenship-living-with-tension/

A Prayer for Humility

Philippians 2:1-11 NKJV
Therefore if there is any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and mercy, 2 fulfill my joy by being like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind. 3 Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself. 4 Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others.
5 Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, 6 who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, 7 but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. 9 Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, 10 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, 11 and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Dear Jesus,

I want to demonstrate the spirit of humility that graces You, the Servant of all. I want to see myself rightly in Your eyes. I don't want to think more highly or more lowly of myself that I ought.

As I gaze into the pages of Your Word, reveal Yourself to me. Reveal myself to me. Shape me and conform me more and more into Your likeness. I want to be like You. I want to model Your fellowship with common folks. I want Your perfect love and a passion for Holy Spirit wrought unity to dominate my life. Slay any vestige of self-promotion within me, so that I am consumed with one Godly passion, to exalt You.

Make me a servant. I want to serve the common and the king. I want to serve the weak and the strong. 

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, 

Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch, 

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you, 

If all men count with you, but none too much...

(Rudyard Kipling)

Help me to be dead to my reputation, and never stir to shape or reclaim it. Consume my heart with identification with You. Make my life into a sweet smelling savor of worship to You, King of my heart, King of Kings, Lord of all. 

Mary Fletcher said of her late husband, John Fletcher, the early Methodist: "He was blessed with so great a degree of humility, as is scarce to be found. I am witness how often he has rejoiced in being treated with contempt. Indeed it seemed the very food of his soul, to be little and unknown."

Remind me that the moment in which I feel that I have attained humility, I have lost any vestige of it.

Be exalted, O God.

In the Name of my ever living Lord, 

Amen.

SPIRIT OF GOD, DESCEND UPON MY HEART

by George Croley (1854)

Spirit of God, descend upon my heart;

Wean it from earth; through all its pulses move;

Stoop to my weakness, mighty as Thou art;

And make me love Thee as I ought to love.

I ask no dream, no prophet ecstasies,

No sudden rending of the veil of clay,

No angel visitant, no opening skies;

But take the dimness of my soul away.

Teach me to feel that Thou art always nigh;

Teach me the struggles of the soul to bear.

To check the rising doubt, the rebel sigh,

Teach me the patience of unanswered prayer.

Hast Thou not bid me love Thee, God and King?

All, all Thine own, soul, heart and strength and mind.

I see Thy cross; there teach my heart to cling:

O let me seek Thee, and O let me find!

Teach me to love Thee as Thine angels love,

One holy passion filling all my frame;

The kindling of the heaven descended Dove,

My heart an altar, and Thy love the flame.

Faith, Race and Our Obligation

http://wbs.edu/2016/07/faith-race-obligation/

Lost Things

Luke 15

Triune God,

Recently, someone showed me Your Holy Trinity in the Gospels. Since then, I have meditated and pondered upon Your reality as Holy Trinity.

Jesus, in Luke 15 You described three lost things: a lost sheep, a lost coin, and a lost son.  In each vignette, someone is seeking to find the lost thing. The Seeker is a picture of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Jesus, You are the Good Shepherd seeking the lost sheep. The Son of God becomes the Good Shepherd who protects the flock and considers the worth of one sheep. Your compassion is so deep, consistent, and generous that once You have ensured the safety of the flock, You pursue the one lost sheep. Your sacrificial love overwhelms me with Your generosity, care, and concern.  Thank You.

Holy Spirit, You are the light of the lamp seeking the lost coin. The tender sentiment of the lost coin, the dowry of marriage, reminds me that the Holy Spirit seals and solemnizes holy marriage before the courts of heaven.  You bear witness and seek to bind two hearts and lives together in holiness, anticipating the day when Jesus, the Groom, weds the Church, His Bride. Every marriage union is Your attempt to recover something that was lost in the Fall, in hopes of ultimate recovery in heaven's bliss.

Heavenly Father, You are the loving Father seeking the return of the prodigal son. Your heart aches when we rebel. You seek us daily, moment by moment. You pursue us. You convict us. You call us. You draw us. You win our rebellious, recalcitrant hearts with Your pursuit of us. You see worth in the worthless. You see hope of identity in You when we have scarred ourselves in identifying with the broken world around us. Mired in filth, destroyed in despair, stinking of sin, You call us to come home. You call us to Yourself.

Thank You, Holy Trinity, for Your self-giving, inexhaustible love, that never wearies of looking for lost things. Thank You for seeking to find and save lost people. You found me. Help me to see lost people as You do, really lost and worth finding. Give me a sense of urgency to find and rescue the lost.

In the Name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
Amen.

When Jesus Comes

John 9:1-12 NKJV
1 Now as Jesus passed by, He saw a man who was blind from birth. 2 And His disciples asked Him, saying, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”
3 Jesus answered, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but that the works of God should be revealed in him. 4 I must work the works of Him who sent Me while it is day; the night is coming when no one can work. 5 As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.”
6 When He had said these things, He spat on the ground and made clay with the saliva; and He anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay. 7 And He said to him, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam” (which is translated, Sent). So he went and washed, and came back seeing.
8 Therefore the neighbors and those who previously had seen that he was blind said, “Is not this he who sat and begged?”
9 Some said, “This is he.” Others said, “He is like him.”
He said, “I am he.”
10 Therefore they said to him, “How were your eyes opened?”
11 He answered and said, “A Man called Jesus made clay and anointed my eyes and said to me, ‘Go to the pool of Siloam and wash.’ So I went and washed, and I received sight.”
12 Then they said to him, “Where is He?”
He said, “I do not know.”

Dear Jesus,

Thank you for the invasive power of Your Gospel.  Thank you that when You come into my life, You turn everything upside down. You are in the habit of doing exactly that.

And the change!  So often the transformation You bring is startling.  It is hard to recognize the transformed from their previous visage.

People don't know what to do with transformed folks. Families restrain the freshly sighted from fanatical proclamations of transformation from darkness to light. Friends restrict the once blind from their sighted path, uncomfortable by a sudden and convicting revelation of light. Society demands sameness. The sinful culture insists that the most vile among us change, and when You effect that change through Your great salvation, they deny the possibility of that very change! Incongruous, but very human.

The blind man dealt with the same response. Once healed, people did not even recognize him.  A face once etched with blindness, now gleamed with joyful sight. Some pointed at him and doubtfully said, "That man looks like the blind guy who was just here, but that can't be him! Same clothes.  Different guy. It's a case of mistaken identity."

Others proclaimed with confident certainty, "It is he."

The contention was only silenced by the word of the once blind man testifying, "I am he."

Transformation. Our culture longs for people to change. But when change comes, whether self-initiated or divinely wrought, we frequently reject it as impossible. In a media age, the sins of our past ever live to haunt us, permanently etched in the memory of cyberspace. 

"Once a sinner, always a sinner," the pundits proclaim.

Then Jesus comes!  You come on the scene and proclaim wholeness. You order a washing away of sin. You afford regeneration from death to life. Transformation.

One sat alone beside the highway begging,

His eyes were blind, the light he could not see;

He clutched his rags and shivered in the shadows,

Then Jesus came and bade his darkness flee.

When Jesus comes the tempter’s pow’r is broken;

When Jesus comes the tears are wiped away.

He takes the gloom and fills the life with glory,

For all is changed when Jesus comes to stay.

(by Oswald Jeffrey Smith)

So we wash, and see.  Thank You. 

In the Name of Jesus, our Savior,

Amen. 

Citizenship

Freedom. Patriotism. Liberty.

I grew up in a community that celebrated faith and freedom. Patriotic programs were frequent events. Each was marked with historical references to the Biblical values that underpin the United States of America. Freedom was theologically connected to Biblical liberty, bought for us with the blood of Jesus Christ, to set us free from the bondage to sin and death. Patriotism, duty, and freedom to worship were co-mingled in a soul-stirring religious context of loyalty to God and country. My eyes grew misty at the sight of the flag. I grew a lump in my throat at the sound of “The Star-Spangled Banner.”

As the tide of public opinion, lifestyle, and government has shifted against the church over the past 50 years, I have developed an ever-increasing angst about celebration of my country. We have less and less to celebrate.

High school history, civics, and government textbooks once called students to citizenship. Our nation has departed from being a nation of citizens to becoming a country of consumers. Freedom is no longer about speech and thought, it has become a freedom to consume. Personal worth is no longer measured by the content of one’s character, but by power, possession, and popularity.

These concerns and questions have driven me back to the Word of God. Scripture teaches that history is moving, not in circles, but in direction—linearity. The Bible teaches that time is proceeding to some great culmination—the Kingdom of God. This Kingdom of God is both already, and not yet.

“Jesus answered, ‘My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would fight, so that I should not be delivered to the Jews; but now My kingdom is not from here.’” (John 18:38)

As a twenty-first century American Christian, I possess a spirit of entitlement. I somehow think that I am entitled to live in a Christian country. Jesus reminds me that I await another country that is yet to come. Salvation by faith in His sinless life, sacrificial death, atoning sacrifice, resurrection from the dead, and ascension to the Father is the basis for hope of that to come.

The church has always been at its best when the tide of government, national opinion, and political pressure was against it. In the first three centuries of the church, the Body of Christ expanded rapidly. Christianity was illegal. Christians died as martyrs for their faith. The early church father, Tertullian, proclaimed, “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.”

Faced with the blood-thirsty Roman Emperors scape-goating the church with rumor and suspicion, killing Christians for sport, and depriving believers of economic power and influence, the church grew. Peter insisted that Christians made the best citizens, especially in a hostile environment.

“Therefore submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake, whether to the king as supreme, or to governors, as to those who are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers and for the praise of those who do good. For this is the will of God, that by doing good you may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men—as free, yet not using liberty as a cloak for vice, but as bondservants of God. Honor all people. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the king.” (I Peter 2:13-17)

Does the Bible teach that we are somehow to roll over and take it? Just submit to the encroaching pressures of the culture?

No. Rather, Scripture suggests that good Christians are exemplary citizens. Paul proclaimed a message of Christian citizenship to the Roman Christians, prior to his execution at the order of the Roman emperor. His witness leaves us with a testimony of strength through submission, even to godless authorities and governments.

“Let every soul be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God. Therefore whoever resists the authority resists the ordinance of God, and those who resist will bring judgment on themselves. For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to evil. Do you want to be unafraid of the authority? Do what is good, and you will have praise from the same. For he is God’s minister to you for good. But if you do evil, be afraid; for he does not bear the sword in vain; for he is God’s minister, an avenger to execute wrath on him who practices evil. Therefore you must be subject, not only because of wrath but also for conscience’ sake. For because of this you also pay taxes, for they are God’s ministers attending continually to this very thing. Render therefore to all their due: taxes to whom taxes are due, customs to whom customs, fear to whom fear, honor to whom honor.” (Romans 13:1-7)

So, we engage warfare, not as the world wars, but as the Church of Jesus Christ wars. We fight with prayer, witnessing, love, acts of mercy, and civil disobedience when necessary. We fight evil, oppression, sin, injustice, and exploitation of the weak and powerless. We press the battle with faith, knowing that Jesus will be victor and we shall reign with Him forever.

“For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ, and being ready to punish all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled.” (II Corinthians 10:2-4)

We are citizens, not simply of our country of residence, but of a country that is yet to come.

“Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace, by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear.” (Hebrews 12:28)

In the words of our Lord Jesus: “Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven… And I say to you that many will come from east and west, and sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven… And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come.”