Read This 08.31.17

Mike Leake

Millennial Motherhood

Here are three traps for young moms.

How to Talk About Race With Your Kids

This is where it all starts.

My 7 Least Productive Habits

Guilty of about five of these.

Why Is My Husband So Angry?

This article explores the connection between anger and sex addiction. Interesting connections here that are worth exploring for those counseling men (and women) with this issue. 

What To Do When Your Conscience Feels Dirty

Dead religion won’t clean it.

4 Lies that Cause Pastors to Neglect Their Families

The struggle for me isn’t necessarily these big ones, it’s the little compromises here and there that add up.

North Koreans Turning to Christ

I hope this is a true report. (As a side note, this is why we should be a little less trigger happy with those nukes).

How Can I Forgive Myself?

I love that first sentence. Amen!

New Rend Collective! Yay!

A Few Thoughts on Article 10 of the Nashville Statement by @CBMWorg

Mike Leake 5 Comments

So this guy took a very hard stance toward a guy who was wrapped up in unrepentant sexual sin. He confronted him on his sinfulness and he didn’t pull any punches doing it. There wasn’t much dialogue or discussion. He just came down really hard on the guy. This was Pat Robertson-blaming-tsunamis-on-sin type of hard. He passionately informed the sexual deviant that because of his actions there would be deep and dark consequences and that people would even die because of his sexual sin.

Now what if I told you that the guy who heard all of this immediately stopped eating. We are talking deep an dark depression. He fell into self-loathing and spent day and night consumed with tears. He was fine before his encounter with the hard-nosed prophet, but now he’s suicidal. It’s so bad that whenever some bad news comes to his door step the messengers are afraid to tell him. The guy seemed suicidal before this bad news. This will certainly put him over the edge.

That guys a jerk, right? I mean if your counsel leads the counselee to become borderline suicidal and overcome with grief day and night, you’ve problem blown it somewhere along the way. Perhaps a bit more discussion and dialogue and a little less condemnatory rhetoric would have been a bit more helpful.

But what if I told you I just described for you the prophet Nathan and his encounter with King David? Nathan didn’t mince any words about David’s adultery with Bathsheba or his murder of Uriah. What David did was clearly wrong and he told him this.

When we read this story in our Bible we don’t blame the feelings of depression, self-loathing, etc. on Nathan the prophet. Ever. We lay them at the feet of David. We love Psalm 51 because it’s such a beautiful picture of repentance and the cleansing that the Lord provides. But there is deep and profound brokenness that undergirds this passage. And that’s actually the key to David’s repentance.

About that Nashville Statement

I’m making this point because of some of the responses I saw yesterday about the Nashville Statement. The statement is one crafted to affirm what we believe the Bible says about biblical sexuality. One of the most heavily critiqued articles in the document is article 10:

WE AFFIRM that it is sinful to approve of homosexual immorality or transgenderism and that such approval constitutes an essential departure from Christian faithfulness and witness.

WE DENY that the approval of homosexual immorality or transgenderism is a matter of moral indifference about which otherwise faithful Christians should agree to disagree.

We are being told that such a statement is insensitive, shuts down dialogue, and will end up harming several LGBTQ people of faith. You cannot speak so strongly against an issue like this, they say. To do so is going to leave several people hurting and feeling condemned and maybe even suicidal and unaccepted.

But this is a fundamental misunderstanding of the position of those of us who would sign the Nashville Statement. It is not our desire for people to feel unnecessary shame. Nor is it our desire for people to experience hopelessness. But that does not mean we do not believe that sin carries with it consequences or even that a David like feeling of shame and deep remorse is not appropriate.

We really do believe that homosexuality is not morally neutral. As such we believe it carries with it consequences. That brokenness you feel when someone shines the light upon your sinfulness, as Nathan did with David, isn’t the fault of the guy with the light. It’s the consequence of living in rebellion. This is true whether the sin is heterosexual, homosexual, or cheating on your taxes.

You can call that insensitive and bigoted all you want. But the truth of the matter is that if we really do love people, and we really do believe this isn’t a morally neutral issue that is just an academic exercise in hermeneutics, then we must take the loving role of Nathan the prophet. Yes, we do this in the context of relationship. Yes, we love people as Jesus did, no matter what sin they are wrapped up in. But none of those things is mutually exclusive to believing that something sets you outside of Christian faithfulness and it needs to be called out and repented of.

So I’m willing to take the risk of Nathan and call the king of our culture (self) to repentance.

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Photo source: here

Read This! 08.29.17

Mike Leake

Hate is the New Sex

This is a really interesting thought.

Preaching Bigger Books in Shorter Series

I spent a whole year in Mark, but I do tend to break larger books up into units.

Local Atheist or Modern Pharisee?

Which one of those is the biggest threat? John Piper provides a good answer.

Three Reasons to Keep Going in Ministry

I appreciate this.

I Don’t Understand Christians Watching Game of Thrones

I totally agree with Kevin in his original article and also in his follow up.

What ‘One Little Word’ Will Fell Satan?

If you are familiar with Luther’s hymn ‘A Mighty Fortress’ you’ve maybe wondered about that one little word that will fell him.

Early Discoveries of a Young Pastor

Glad to know my experience isn’t unique.

Netflix Was Eclipsed By the Eclipse

This just proves that a bigger and better story will always captivate.

I have gotten this question a few times. Love Dr. Plummer’s answer:

When We Use Finishing Tools On Demo Day

Mike Leake

“We urge you, brothers, admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with them all.” 1 Thessalonians 5:14

That’s tough, isn’t it? It’s difficult to use the right tool for the right job. It’s so easy to get busy and frustrated and end up doing something dumb and immature–like using a sledge hammer on a finishing nail. In these moments we put on a prophetic edge when we probably should have been a bit more pastoral. We chide when we should have been comforting.

But there is an equal temptation on the other side of this. We can also pamper when we ought to be prophetically proclaiming. In these times we are trying to pick up our finishing tools when it’s still demo day. There are some things we shouldn’t be moderate about. There is a time for no longer deliberating but to act upon the sure foundation of God’s Word. We coddle when we should be striving for conviction.

This is a tough balance and it takes biblical wisdom to know how to walk this tight rope. If you use the wrong tool at the wrong time we can wreak some serious havoc. Paul warns us of this much in 1 Thessalonians. It shatters community when we go about beating our struggling and hurting brothers with truth grenades and sledgehammers. Likewise it weakens our body when we call for moderation on issues which aren’t muddy.

I appreciate these words of Richard Sibbes:

And yet often we see a false spirit in those who call for moderation. Their doing so is but to carry their own projects with the greater strength; and if they prevail they will hardly show that moderation to others which they now call for from others. And there is a proud kind of moderation likewise, when men will take upon them to censure both parties, as if they were wiser than both, although, if the spirit be right, an onlooker may see more than those that are in conflict. (Sibbes, 30)

I thought of this quote after preaching on Sunday. I thought of it because I spoke very passionately about the need for not having a party spirit. In preaching on Exodus 2:11-25 I said something like this:

This is what happens when we try to solve things on our own and in our own way and in our own wisdom. When we use unholy methods to try to accomplish holy ends. We lose our moral authority to speak into things. When we identify ourselves with evil and evil actions we lose this ability. The most persuasive church is the one that looks the least like the world. The one that is radically centered on Jesus Christ. The one that is not tied to anything except for Jesus. The one which can speak into the evil from the Left and evil from the Right. We cannot sell this birthright for a pot of stew. We can be zealous like Moses and have the heart of a deliverer…to have your heart in the right place…and set your rescue mission back 40 years. Moses has the disposition of a deliverer but not yet the dependence of one. For, it is only God who can accomplish this rescue mission.

Was I guilty of Sibbes’ moderation? Or was I simply taking a prophetic posture? As I’ve thought about it I think, at least in this instance, it was the former. And what motivates me to say this are words from Zack Eswine. In Preaching to a Post-Everything World, Eswine says, “what drives prophetic feeling and imagination is concern for covenant faithfulness to God and neighbor. The prophets are passionate for relational faithfulness. Double love stirs the prophet’s heart” (121).

So that’s why, for that moment during the sermon on Sunday, I took up the tone of the prophet. I believe that is the tool the job called for. I see far too many of us selling our birthright for a pot of political stew. I see us calling for moderation only when it serves our political ends and taking what we assume is the prophet’s tone when we are good and fired up towards our enemies. But neither are biblically faithful. The prophet isn’t partisan. He’s tied to the word of God alone. And that’s a sword that doesn’t merely hang on the wall of any party. It cuts us all.

My aim in writing this is to give an example of the difficulty of knowing how/when to use each tool in the preacher’s took kit. And, frankly, I’m better at using some than I am at using others. But none of them should remain on the shelf. And that’s my point. When we call for moderation we should check our hearts and make sure we aren’t guilty of the type Sibbes referenced. Likewise, when we take up the prophet’s tone we should check our hearts and make sure that what has us boiling is a passion for kingdom faithfulness and love for our fellow man.

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Photo source: here