Borrowed Light

An Open Letter to LifeWay Trustees

January 28, 2015Mike Leake 3 Comments

Dearest LifeWay Trustees,

I am an associate pastor at a local church in Indiana. Our mission is to be a church united to enjoy God’s grace and to extend His glory. Part of our vision is similar to your vision. We, like you, desire to provide biblical solutions for life.

As such we are not shy about promoting LifeWay material for our church. We always, happily, use the LifeWay’s VBS material. Several of our Sunday school classes are going through The Gospel Project and others are using the Bible Studies for Life. We are also excited about the new Explore the Bible curriculum.

We love LifeWay and our people know that. The many magazines floating around our church, the VBS signs, and the curriculum in our Sunday School classes communicate to our people that LifeWay is a place that you can trust.

As such our people shop at LifeWay with confidence. They go into the store with the hopes of finding a good book to help in their walk with Christ. And they shop like most people do—they pick up the things that the store is heavily plugging and promoting. They scan the bestsellers section to find what must be a good book.

You and I both know that unless they go in their specifically to find a classic like Pilgrim’s Progress they are going to walk out with something like Heaven Is For Real. They purchase what is heavily promoted.

Now we consistently tell our congregation to be discerning. We encourage them to listen to our sermons with a discerning ear and heart. And certainly that they ought to watch television preachers and read Christian books with discernment. But you and I both know that we tend to let down our guard when we trust someone. And our people trust LifeWay.

Here is the crux of my difficulty and the reason for my letter. I love LifeWay and want to partner with LifeWay. I believe, at the core, our mission is similar to yours:

LifeWay Christian Resources exists to assist churches and believers to evangelize the world to Christ, develop believers, and grow churches by being the best provider of relevant, high quality, high value Christian products and services.

And yet, I’m finding that while LifeWay often substantially helps our congregation it also does harm. There are times when we must spend a great deal of energy undoing the erroneous teaching swallowed by some of our members rather than engaging in positive building in their lives.

Charles Spurgeon was correct that ‘a lie will go round the world while truth is pulling its boots on’. The false teaching of some of the prosperity teachers sold at LifeWay (TD Jakes, John Hagee) will spread much more quickly and deeply in the thinking of our people than the slow plodding of a churches pastoral ministry. This is not to mention some of the books like Jesus Calling and The Circle Maker which attaches itself to the very way in which our people engage in spiritual disciplines.

We are laboring hard to disciple our people and help them to grow in their knowledge of the Scriptures and their love for the Lord. LifeWay’s refusal to pull such books from the shelf is making our work that much more difficult.

We are not alone in this. As you know our SBC Convention has recently adopted a resolution on the sufficiency of Scripture regarding the afterlife. In that resolution it reads, “many devout and well-meaning people allow these to become their source and basis for an understanding of the afterlife rather than scriptural truth”.

And yet books like Heaven Is For Real are heavily promoted in our LifeWay stores.

Please stop.

I’m urging you to go further than attaching discernment stickers to books. That only makes heresy seem like forbidden fruit. It only increases interest and fosters an idea that only some books should be read with discernment. Instead, what I am urging you to do is to pull the books off your shelves and stop profiting from the sale of error.

I understand the logistics of this are difficult. After all, who gets to decide which books are in error and which ones are not? I know it is tough—but I trust the people at LifeWay. You have many smart and discerning people working for you. You know which books are promoting error. You know, as Bible-loving Southern Baptists, which prosperity books make you uncomfortable. Pull them.

Lose a buck for the glory of God and the good of our churches.

In-Christ,
Mike Leake

—

I crafted this letter back in June of 2014 but let it sit. But this recent comic by Adam Ford has stirred up my heart again to call for change with the books that LifeWay sells. While I don’t believe Dr. Rainer is accurately represented in that comic, I do believe there is truth there. Of those top 10 books only Joel Osteen can’t be found in a LifeWay store. Brothers and sisters, for a company that seeks to provide “biblical solutions for life” this should not be so.

Today in Blogworld 01.28.15

January 28, 2015Mike Leake

The Giving Tree of Motherhood

I think many women feel motherhood to be a burden but are a tad free to admit it—much less to take this burden to the Lord to find freedom and delight.

1st Century Fragment of Mark: How Should We Respond

I’m excited about this find and I also appreciate Justin Taylor’s encouragement to temper our excitement.

Study Shows You Can’t Think Straight When Your iPhone Is In The Other Room

Can you say “idolatry”?

20 Things I Want My Daughters to Understand About Being a Woman

I have so much to learn about being a daddy to a little girl. Lists like this are helpful to me.

This is crazy…also kind of looks like a level on Super Mario Bros.

The Most Shared Verses in Their Context (Colossians 3:23-24)

January 27, 2015Mike Leake 1 Comment

Last year I looked at the Top 10 Most Shared Bible Verses from 2013 in their context. They have recently posted their 2014 list and to my surprise there are ten new most shared verses, so I figured I’d look at these ten popular verses in their context again this year. Today we will look Colossians 3:23-24—which according to YouVersion was the most shared verse in 2014.

The Verse:

Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ. (Colossians 3:23-24 ESV)

The Context:

Colossians 3:18-4:1 is a shortened version of Ephesians 5:22—6:9. Just as in Ephesians, Paul begins his letter by expounding upon the complete redemption that believers have in Christ Jesus. And once again, like Ephesians, in the middle of the letter Paul begins to exhort these believers based upon what Christ has accomplished.

In Colossians 3, Paul encourages the Colossian believers to “put to death” what is earthly and to “put on” that which corresponds to their new life in Christ. I believe in 3:17 Paul sums up that section by saying, “And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.”

After this exhortation—which I believe applies to relationships within the church at large—Paul now makes application upon the home. He moves from wives to husbands to children, and then to slaves. It is within this exhortation to slaves that we find Colossians 3:23-24.

In context this verse is directed to household slaves. So can we apply these verses today if we aren’t slaves?

The Meaning:

In order to understand this verse we have to first dispel our typical notions of “slavery”. The slaves that Paul is speaking to in this passage are not people enslaved against their own will. But we also cannot too quickly dismiss the fact that a slave is owned by his master. Douglas Moo is correct when he says:

It is true that ancient slavery differed in some important ways from slavery practiced, for instance, in 19th century America…But it is also true that ancient and modern slavery, in its various forms, has in common the basic fact that one human owns and has virtually ultimate control over another. (Moo, 308)

So we not be too quick to make a one-to-one connection between slavery and employment. Paul’s main point here is that even if you find yourself in a really terrible situation like ancient slavery you are still to represent Jesus in the way you work heartily.

And lest anyone believe that Paul is here condoning some sort of slavery it is important to note that he refers to their masters as “earthly”. Which, I believe if you follow Paul’s line of thought even this institution is part of the old age. Yet because of the already, not yet of redemption while they wait for Jesus to make all things right—they are too serve with vigor as if they are serving the Lord.

So, what meaning does this have for people today that don’t find themselves enslaved? Can we apply this to the employer and employee relationship?

Yes. Even though the near application is to slaves, we see that these principles apply to the employer and employee relationship as well. That which would have made a faithful slave will also make a faithful employee. Likewise, the attitude that would make a master faithful to the Lord also apply to an employer.

In fact, there are seeds here in Colossians that would actually lead to an eradication of slavery and lead to a shift to an employee/employer type of relationship. Therefore, it is not difficult to make this application.

Conclusion:

All of this leads me to wonder why in the world Colossians 3:23-24 is the most shared verse. My only hypothesis is that many believers, or their friends, are in jobs that they do not necessarily enjoy. As such we need encouragement to be faithful in our work.

Furthermore, within Colossians 3:23-24 is a purpose for your work—you are working for God and for his kingdom. That is a reason to get out of bed in the morning. Yeah, you may dislike your job and your boss may be a real goober—but Jesus is Lord over you and He is wonderful. Serve Him with passion and that’ll transform the way you view your Mondays.