Do you agree with this – don’t focus on heaven!

This is from David Foster, pastor in Nashville, putting in his plug for his new message series (which seem to all sound alike to me)  titled “The Power to Prevail.”

No matter how much we try to focus on heaven, none of us can comprehend what eternity will be, or how it could possibly be better than the best life we have in the here and now, with all of our friends and familiar things around us.  But the truth of the matter is, we’re not called to focus on that, or to completely understand something that we have no way of comparing or experiencing in the present.  Our calling is to live.

Let me get this straight. We’re not called to focus on heaven? Don’t you think there is a better way of saying this? Is this really what you want to say? How about, we’re not called to focus on hell either, which is the other side of the coin!

Even if you agree with NT Wright’s assertions about our all too Platonic views of heaven, and I do agree with him, surely this overstatement by Foster can’t be right. I think what he wants to say is something else, like living out our destiny in the future in the here and now is important. Or eternal life begins now. Or something like that.

But don’t tell me that I am not to focus on the Blessed Hope, the grand culmination, the full rest at the end of the line and the removal of every tear.  Teaching people to prevail without that focus is Readers’-Digest-reading-while-you-are-sitting-in-the-dentist’s-office kind of spirituality. It’ll distract you for a while but you would never read this stuff at home.

Yawn! another sermon on sex!!! Or Yikes! The church should ban ugly pastors from preaching on sex.

Initial reaction – do ugly pastors (my group!) preaching on sex make people gag? Or do pastors who have sex appeal (not my group!) pull this off better? If your answer is the latter is yes and your answer to the former is no, it should make you wonder about this kind of preaching.

Two other things about this. One, this topic splashed on billboards and flyers around town tells you how much group think there is among us evangelicals. “It worked over there – let’s do it to” type of thinking. A lot of what we are getting is another fad passing through. There’s something not really bad about this – good ideas should be spread around. But bad ideas get spread around, too, just as easily.

Two, the churches by and large doing this topic are the megachurches. I think this kind of topic so heavily advertised to get more butts in the seats tells you a bit of what is going on, the mindset. At the root of this is the attractional model of services. And that train doesn’t ever stop. And it can lead to the ridiculous.

I can’t remember Hybels or Warren hyping a sermon series like this. They might have since I am not local where these guys are. They’re very good but they are not gaudy, and they don’t leave us gawking at their wives after an R-rated sermon on sex or leave the ladies thinking about how lucky the pastor’s wife is. I think we need some really ugly pastors preaching on sex.

The Dog Delusion

 

 

 

 

 

 

A bit of a take off on Richard Dawkin’s The God Delusion.

Mars Hill Church to Host ABC Nightline Debate this coming Friday, March 20

Does Satan exist?
This question will be debated next Friday when ABC visits Mars Hill Church to record a “Face Off” debate for Nightline. The debate will then be aired as several segments on an upcoming broadcast of the news program.

Participating in the debate will be:

For the existence of Satan:

Pastor Mark Driscoll; founding pastor, Mars Hill Church

Annie Lobert; executive director, “Hookers for Jesus”

Against the existence of Satan:

Dr. Deepak Chopra; president, Alliance for a New Humanity

Bishop Carlton Pearson; author, “The Gospel of Inclusion”

Read more about the debate on the Nightline website.

President Obama’s Prayer Partners, according to the New York Times

Here’s the article.

Among the religious leaders the President calls is Jim Wallis. While I do not share many of Wallis’ views (and many I do), everyone believes he is a thoughtful man who does not have a knee jerk approach to the true demands of religion. I read and listen to Wallis, and I am glad the President includes him in the circle.