by Christian on November 02, 2009
In part I of “Is Rob Bell An Evangelical” we examined the upward component of evangelicalism along with some key doctrines evangelicals have traditionally embraced.
We now examine the inward and outward components.
The Inward
Historically, evangelicals have been a strictly disciplined people. To master oneself was the greatest battle. Inward disciplines like solitude, prayer, fasting, meditation, spiritual reflection and silence became trademarks of early evangelicals – a buffet for the soul.
The momentum generated by the awakenings on both sides of the Atlantic continued through the 18th century, lost some steam at the end of the 18th century, and then was rekindled in the early 19th century by a generation of Christians that reacted against the spiritual complacency of their parents (forgive my over-simplification).
If you want a more detailed synopsis, I invite you to wade through Owen Chadwick’s two volumes on the Victorian Church. Chadwick is a marvelous historian and captures the mood of the Victorian age.
If you want a cliff notes version of evangelicalism, Ian Bradley’s The Call To Seriousness does well to describe the spiritual disciplines and the attitudes of the evangelicals in Victorian England (at least within the Church of England).
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by Christian on October 29, 2009
On September 27th, Rob Bell, best-selling Christian writer and pastor, told the Boston Globe that he embraces “the term evangelical, if by that we mean a belief that we together can actually work for change in the world, caring for the environment, extending to the poor generosity and kindness, a hopeful outlook.”
Is Rob Bell an evangelical?
What is an Evangelical?
In the Rabbinic tradition the term evangelical (besora in the Hebrew), occured six times in the Old Testament. It meant “glad tidings.”
In the Greek world the news of the birth of a Caesar or emperor is described as euangelion. The messenger of that good news was greatly celebrated (or in the case of the Magi, apprehended).
Mark used the word euangelion eight times in his narrative. The Apostle Paul used it sixty times.
Historically, evangelicals have been “good news people.”
As I have come to understand it, the term “evangelical” has three main components: the upward, the inward, and the outward. I have collected a list of other beliefs that younger evangelicals are also deeming important.
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by Christian on October 26, 2009
In a recent turn towards the medieval, a handwritten Bible will be published this fall by Zondervan Publishers.
On June 24th, after touring 100 cities in 40 states, the Bible Across America bus has collected handwriting samples from 31,173 Americans. Every verse of the Bible has been copied by hand, each sentence written by a different person.
During the Dark Ages, if you wanted a copy of the Gospel narratives, you would have needed to translate the Bible by hand, letter by letter, word by word. It often took Celtic scribes years to accomplish this, and their work is not only laboriously decorated, but also highly artistic (See Book of Kells, housed at Trinity College in Dublin).
Guternberg’s Press comes along in 1440 and revolutionizes the copying of the Scriptures. No longer did the Bible require a mixture of powdered ink and calf skin, now it could be replicated on cheap paper in mass production. The Protestant Reformation benefited greatly from this invention, and some argue it would not have happened without it.
Yet did Guttenberg’s invention come with a cost?
The creators of the St. John’s Bible think so. The Saint John’s Bible Project, scheduled to be completed this year, will be the first Bible to be copied by hand in the tradition of the illuminated manuscripts since the medieval era. It took four million dollars to complete, hundreds of 2X3 foot pieces of vellum and 160 illuminations. See a sample from the Gospel of Matthew.
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by Christian on October 23, 2009
As I will be spending Christmas this summer in Greccio, the village in Italy where St. Francis started the first nativity, my thoughts have gravitated to the life and ministry of Francis (1181-1226).
In his early life, Francis wanted to be a warrior like one of the knights around King Arthur’s round table. He enrolled in the army, was defeated in a battle against Perugia, and imprisoned. His father, a wealthy merchant, bailed him out, and Francis went back to live in Assisi.
On a pilgrimage to Rome, Francis had a life changing experience. He saw the lepers and beggars throwing money at St. Peter’s tomb and his heart broke for them. He decided to become one of them, begging for his sustenance (today the more conservative Franciscans still rely on the community for their survival).
His luxurious life became disciplined.
Assisi is a cold place to be in the winter, and Francis often deprived his body of necessary warmth. His temptations were strong, and he often threw himself on thorny bushes in hopes of alleviating his lust for Clare.
It’s not surprising he died prematurely.
Often retreating into the caves around Assisi, Francis craved solitude with God. A community of brothers arose around him, and Francis traveled with them from village to village healing the sick, taming wolfs and preaching to animals.
Now, whether or not you believe Bonaventure’s animal accounts, it must be said that someone so radically abandoned to God cannot be tethered to the rules of normality.
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by Christian on October 21, 2009
In an attempt to understand the monastic practice of flagellation, I found a short blue ethernet cable in my office that worked nicely this morning.
Now before you think that I’ve gone completely monastic, let me explain.
Luther’s Lashes
Martin Luther was once caught in a terrible thunderstorm in Stotterheim, Germany. He made a vow that if he survived, he would become a monk.
He did survived, and in 1505, he enrolled as an Augustinian monk at the Black Monastery in Erfurt. To the great disappointment of his family (his father wanted him to be a lawyer), Luther began to study Greek and Hebrew for his theological education.
The following two years were excruciating for Luther. I often think he must have been a type “A” perfectionist sort of guy. Luther struggled to reconcile every detail of what he found in the Bible with what he practiced as a monk.
So began months of self torment – fasting, sleeping on stones, obsessive confession, and flagellation.
In the past, monks used all sorts of things to whip themselves: birthwood branches, tongs, sticks and rods of all sorts. They thought that the practice could bring purification. In fact, the early church required those who were disobedient to whip themselves in penance. Spare the rod, spoil the soul. In 1259, Raniero Fasani of Italy organized a brotherhood of flagellants who would later punish themselves in hopes of ridding the population of the Black Death.
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by Christian on October 18, 2009
A few days ago, I had lunch on the ruined altar of a 1,500 year old cathedral in St. Andrews, Scotland. Allocating only 30 minutes for the meal, I ended up staying for over an hour.
These days golf pulls pilgrims to St. Andrews, and rightly so. The Links courses are quite the Mecca! But for fifteen hundred years pilgrims have been coming to St. Andrews for other reasons.
Legend has it that in AD 733, the bones of Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, found their way to this shore. For almost a millennia, these bones pulled peasants up out of Italy and Spain, through Gaul into northern Britannia. St. Andrews became the main attraction north of Hadrian’s Wall, rivaling Camino de Santiago in Spain, and even Rome and Jerusalem.
Located on the northeastern tip of the city, the cathedral is strikingly over-proportioned. It dwarfs all who enter, as big as anything you’d find in Durham, Ely, or Canterbury.
A Pilgrim’s Progress
Five minutes into my sandwich, I imagined what this cathedral must have looked like before its destruction. From the ruins of the apse, a pilgrim’s gaze must have immediately been raised. European cathedrals often elevated the eye, pulling it off of oneself, off of the me-ness inherent to humanity.
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by Christian on October 15, 2009
In a recent conversation with Chuck Colson, I asked him what he thought about the health of Christianity in the United States.
Colson expressed optimism about younger evangelicalism, a renewal movement within the Protestant church. Yet he also acknowledged that there will be many challenges in the years ahead. Over the course of our conversation, he reflected on the unpopularity of the concept of Truth, and how being a Christian often requires one to stand alone against the flow of the current.
But Colson also expressed excitement about younger evangelical voices that are communicating the tenants of Christian truths in a fresh and relevant way against the backdrop of a postmodern and relativistic culture.
Time magazine recently listed Charles Colson as one of the twenty-five leading evangelicals in America. After examining his biography, it’s not difficult to understand why.
For an overview of Colson’s life, click here. And, for a recent interview with Chuck Colson published in Time click here.
The ultimate story of redemption, Chuck Colson’s life continues to inspire those inside and outside the walls of prison. For evangelicals everywhere, Colson remains a mentor, a hero, and a champion of Christian orthodoxy.
by Christian on October 13, 2009
As I was researching here in St. Andrews on the history of Victorian theology, I stumbled upon a very interested rabbit that I had no choice but to chase.
In 1939, J. R. R. Tolkien, author of The Lord of the Rings trilogy, presented a paper on “Fairy Stories” here at St. Andrews. His paper was published in Essays Presented to Charles Williams (Oxford University Press), and it ignited his thoughts of creating a dragon named Smeagol who he would invent for his later tome, The Hobbit.
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by Christian on October 11, 2009
The Afterlife – With Don Piper
On this podcast, I talk to Don Piper, author of 90 Minutes In Heaven. Also in the podcast is an interview with co-author Cecile Murphey. Murphey discusses his first reaction to Piper’s story, and also shares some thoughts about the process of writing.
When an 18 wheeler crossed the center line and crashed into his Ford Escape, Don Piper was killed instantly. “I was covered up,” he said, “and they were waiting for the medical examiner to come in and fill out the paper work so the body could be transported to a mortuary.”
But was death the ending for him? As Piper recounts, the real journey had just begun . . .
by Christian on October 07, 2009
Recently, I was looking through the biography of Larry King’s My Remarkable Story, and I came across a line that stuck out at me. He writes that we need to understand people by looking at three main things in their life: their background, their context, and then the complications they find themselves in. King would know.
So I’m going to run a particularly favorite dead guy, Charles Haddon Spurgeon, through Larry King’s biographical filter:
Background:
Charles Haddon Spurgeon was born In 1834, in the little town of Kelvedon, England. By the age of sixteen, he had already developed a reputation as the preacher boy of the fens. He had no formal theological training when he accepted the pastorate at New Park Street Chapel in London in 1854, and when the crowds became too numerous, Spurgeon moved to the Metropolitan Tabernacle. Here, he would gain the reputation of being a mega-church pastor before mega-churches were popular.
Yet Spurgeon was no typical C.E.O. pastor. Not only did Spurgeon know the names of every member in his congregation, but he also knew the names of their children, grandchildren, and pets. He preached weekly to 6,000 people, sometimes to 10,000 people, one time to 23,000, all without the aid of microphones or amplification.
Context
As the 18th century gave way to the 19th, the industrial revolution altered the landscape of Europe. Darwin’s Origin of Species would revolutionize the study of nature. And medical advances would alleviate diseases previously untreatable.
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