Bandits No More

Getting to Philippians 4

Posted on May 3, 2010 by Richard Heyduck

Have you ever noticed what Paul said in Philippians 4? We find him saying things like:

Rejoice in the Lord always; Again, I say, rejoice!
I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.
My God shall supply all your needs through his riches in glory in Christ Jesus.

Sounds pretty good, doesn’t it? Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to say those things in our own lives?

We have a couple of guys in our church who run marathons. I think it would be cool to run a marathon. I think I’ll do it next week. If you knew me, you’d think that’s laughable. Though I exercise each week, I haven’t run much at all in several years. No way I’d be able to run a marathon next week.

My daughter likes to watch medical shows on TV. Pretty cool how they help people with those surgeries. I think I’ll take up surgery next week. I’m sure the unanimous comment is, “Not on me!” Though I’ve done successful surgeries on electronics before, surgery on a living being – at least one that you want to remain living after the surgery – requires years of education and training. No way I could do that next week.

I like music. One of the pieces I’ve liked over the years is Mozart’s Piano Sonata in A. I first heard it years ago, in an arrangement for flute and guitar. I don’t remember who was playing the guitar, but I’m pretty sure Jean Pierre Rampal was playing the flute. No way I could play two instruments, so I’ll just aim to play it on piano next week. Again everyone who knows me laughs. While I can play a couple of songs “one finger” on the piano, and am well enough educated to know that pianos have 88 keys, I’ve never had a piano lesson in my life.

In each of these cases – running a marathon, doing surgery, or playing beautiful music – discipline is required. In each case I must submit myself to a particular way of life before I will ever make progress. It’s the same way with Paul in Philippians 4. With our cherry picking propensity, we easily identify these verses in Philippians 4 as favorites. We memorize them (maybe), and let them cheer us up. And they can do that. But by ignoring their context, we miss their real power.

If we begin at chapter 1 of Philippians, we find Paul in prison. He doesn’t know whether he’ll live or die. The soldiers could come in at any time and say, “Let’s go Paul, time for your execution.”

Prison? Execution? Not my idea of a “Rejoice in the Lord always” environment. Not a situation in which I’d be thinking, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. “My God will supply all your needs through his riches in glory in Christ Jesus” would probably not be my first thought. Instead I might be thinking, “Get me out of here God! I’ve served you faithfully all these years, and here I am in jail – and it’s all your fault!”

And yet we see Paul saying things like, “Rejoice in the Lord, always!” What made the difference? It was Jesus. More than that, it was taking up the way of Jesus as the determinative pattern of his life. In Philippians 2 we see Paul looking at Jesus. Jesus did count count equality with God as something to be exploited, but made himself nothing, taking the nature of a servant, humbling himself even to the point of death on a cross.

In Philippians 3 we see that Paul has taken that story of Jesus and made it his own. A Hebrew of Hebrews. Of the tribe of Benjamin. A zealous Pharisee, so serious about his business, so dedicated to the way of God, that he took it upon himself to persecute the church. As to legalistic righteousness, faultless. But he didn’t settle for that. Instead, he counted all that as loss – as rubbish – that he might gain Christ and be found in him. He would depend on Christ’s righteousness, not his own. He sought conformation with Christ – even in his suffering, even in his death – so that he might also be conformed with him in his resurrection.

It was only by taking up the way of Jesus as his own way of life, that Paul was able to become the kind of person who was able to say what he said when he said it. If we want to be able to say, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me,” the only way is to become the kind of people who take up the way of Christ as our own.

Posted in Jesus, Paul, Spirituality | 1 Comment

Books I’m reading now

Posted on April 26, 2010 by Richard Heyduck

Having a short attention span, I tend to read several books at once. The ones I’m engaging in right now include these:

1. James Davison Hunter, To Change the World. I’ve just started it, so I don’t have much to say yet. It is a topic I’ve been thinking about for thirty years.

2. Friedrich Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morality. Nietzsche is on a helpful track in his historical approach to morality. He seems to Hegelian, however, in looking for monolithic cultural forces to instigate change.

3. Richard Posner, A Failure of Capitalism. A book that is not directly related to any of my research projects, yet, hopefully, useful to my understanding of our times. Only through the first chapter – so far Posner is not optimistic about our situation.

4. Paul Ricoeur, Time and Narrative (v.1). A book (ok, the first volume of a series) that I should have read long ago. His discussion of Augustine’s understanding of time, particularly the relationship between past, present and future, is especially stimulating.

5. Martin Heidegger, Being and Time. Another slow read. I prefer Heidegger’s Being-in-the-world to the usual subject-object dichotomy of modernity – a big improvement. Wish he hadn’t gone Nazi.

6. Bible reading this week is focusing on Joshua, the book I’m reading with the guys, and Philippians, my primary text for next Sunday.

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Reading Cavanaugh on the Invention of “Religion”

Posted on April 14, 2010 by Richard Heyduck

One of the books I’m working through now is William Cavanaugh’s The Myth of Religious Violence. If you’re open to a little heresy (not heresy directed toward Christianity, but toward religion-like phenomena like nationalism, capitalism, Marxism, etc.), check it out. His contention is not that it is never the case that a cultural phenomenon we’ve been trained to call “religion” (e.g., Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, etc.) resorts to or is complicit in violence. Rather, he is arguing that because the boundary lines between “religious” phenomena and “secular” phenomena are so arbitrary (and of recent Western vintage), they are of little use in ascribing greater tendencies toward violence in “religion” than in, say, “nationalism.”

Here’s a choice paragraph (p. 120-1):

“’The West,’ ‘modernity,’ ‘liberalism,’ and so on are not simply monolithic realities, but are ideals or projects that are always contestable. Part of the function of ideology, however, is to present these projects as based on essential realities that are simply there, part of the way things are. As we saw in Locke’s writings, the religious-secular distinction is presented as embedded in the immutable nature of things. In fact, however, this distinction was born with a new configuration of power and authority in the West and was subsequently exported to parts of the world colonized by Europeans. Within the West, religion was invented as a transhistorical and transcultural impulse embedded in the human heart, essentially distinct from the public business of government and economic life. To mix religion with public life was said to court fanaticism, sectarianism, and violence. The religious-secular divide thus facilitated the transfer in the modern era of the public loyalty of the citizen from Christendom to the emergent nation-state. Outside the West, the creation of religion and its secular twin accompanied the attempts of colonial powers and indigenous modernizing elites to marginalize certain aspects of non-Western cultures and create space for the smooth functioning of state and market interests.”

Here in the US our civil religion is very closely tied to our Christianity for all but a few baptist (“small ‘b’ baptist,” as James Wm. McClendon, Jr. would say.) sects and groups we usually consider way beyond the pale like the Jehovah’s Witnesses. Which kind of religion results in more deaths each year? Which inflicts more violence around the world?

Posted in Culture, Ecclesiology, Politics | 2 Comments

Thinking about our Church values

Posted on April 14, 2010 by Richard Heyduck

Craig Groeschel is thinking about and refining his church values. I find his comments worth listening to, so here they are, along with some comments of my own.

1) We are faith-filled, big thinking, bet-the-farm risk takers. We’ll never insult God with small thinking and safe living.

Craig doesn’t tread lightly, does he? We’ve done a little of this here in Pittsburg – acquiring the property across the street comes to mind. But in many ways we do value playing things safe, both in our individual lives and in our life as a church. Part of our reluctance to risk might be that we’re so heavily invested in our status quo. We (families and the church) have buildings we love, use regularly (and still owe on). The church in Georgia that recently sold its building so it could have more money for ministry might as well be on another planet as far as we are concerned. We have children to raise. We thrive on continuity and predictability.

2) We are all about the “capital C” Church! The local church is the hope of the world and we know we can accomplish infinitely more together than apart.

One of the good things about Pittsburg is the degree to which churches are willing to work together, to work as partners in ministry rather than competitors. When an arsonist torched our youth building several years ago another church in town took up an offering for us. That wouldn’t happen in every community I’ve lived in. We participate in each others events and have events in common. we’ve even crossed the Catholic/Protestant divide. Considering the demographics of our community there are plenty of people around who are unattached to any church for all our churches to grow without merely shuffling sheep. And maybe we’ll fulfill Jesus’ prayer in John 17 at the same time.

3) We are spiritual contributors not spiritual consumers. The church does not exist for us. We are the church and we exist for the world.

With the current economic downturn – which hit our county especially hard, with our major industry/employer going through bankruptcy – there is a temptation to hold on to all we have with a death grip. But that is death. In the midst of challenges our people have remained generous and willing to meet the needs of people. I’m still convinced that generosity is healthy.

4) We give up things we love for things we love even more. It’s an honor to sacrifice for Christ and His church.

What a good way to put it! We don’t just give up junk – the useless things lying around, the things we no longer value. We give up good things, things we enjoy and care about. We give them up for the sake of greater things. The tough part is taking the time to examine our values.

5) We wholeheartedly reject the label mega-church. We are a micro-church with a mega-vision.

If anyone called us a mega-church, we’d have to think them sorely misguided. Surely they don’t know what they’re talking about. Our biggest crowd in my seven years here has been 378. We average just under 200. We have just over 400 members. While this is mega compared to one of the first churches I pastored (Bloomburg UMC – 10 people on Sunday), that’s what it’d be called. But that’s not what most people mean by mega. For us, then, we’d say something like, “We whole-heartedly reject the label small church.” First, we serve a mighty God who raised Jesus from the dead and gives us the Holy Spirit. We may be few in number in a town of small population in the 3rd smallest county in Texas, but our reach extends to the ends of the earth. Second, we still have some work to do on the micro end of things. We need more small groups where people can be intimately known, loved, discipled and equipped for ministry, places where people can speak and hear the truth in love.

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10 Books

Posted on April 3, 2010 by Richard Heyduck

Joining in the train that has been following Tyler Cowen, here are ten books that have shaped me to make me what I am today.

The Bible – While I first encountered the Bible as a young child, only in high school did I start reading it on my own. As a follower of Jesus, I find it very valuable as I seek to know him, his purposes and his ways of acting in the world. I like John Wesley’s idea of being homo unius libri.
The Lord of the Rings – This is another set I first read in high school. Though I was an extensive reader beforehand, somehow I didn’t even learn of Tolkein until my sophomore year. But then I read them again and again, to myself and to my little brother.
The Journal of John Wesley – By the time I arrived at college, I knew I had a call to ministry in the United Methodist Church. Though I’d been a member of the church for years, I thought it would be a good idea to go to the source. I read Wesley’s Journal from beginning to end in my free time, finding a man seeking to know God and passionate to see others learn of Jesus and take up his way of life.
Father Brown – The first Chesterton I read was Everlasting Man, but the works I keep going back to are the Father Brown Mysteries. The root of Father Brown’s insight that allows him to solve mysteries stems from his deep insight into sinners, knowing himself to be one of their number.
After Virtue – I first saw Alasdair MacIntyre’s After Virtue at the Asbury Seminary bookstore, shortly before I graduated. Since I was about to return to Texas, I was trying to hold off on book buying, so I wasn’t able to read it until I started pastoring. By that time I was far from any sources other than Inter Library Loan. MacIntyre’s picture of the fragmented status of ethics in modernity struck me as eerily similar to the status of doctrine in my own denomination. Reading After Virtue wasn’t enough, so I went on to read most of his other works, the most important of which was likely Whose Justice? Which Rationality?
Genesis of Doctrine – I remember struggling to justify paying the price Blackwell wanted for this book. The subject was already under my skin, so I had to get this book. It helped put some skin on the bones of my thinking begun by reading MacIntyre.
Theology in an Age of Scientific Reasoning – I encountered Nancey Murphy’s book during my second semester of doctoral work, not surprisingly, when I was taking a course she taught on postmodernity. Nancey became the lead professor for the rest of my work and introduced me to the relevance of the philosophy of science.
How to Do Things with Words – J.L.Austin’s little book has always struck me as a book many have picked up and few have finished. His notion of “performative utterance,” introduced in the first chapters has so captured people that they often fail to notice what he does with it by the end of the book. But in an age where so many are inclined toward anti-realism, it sounded like an easy way out.
New Testament and the People of God – Though my main area of study was philosophical theology, I didn’t limit myself to that field. I think it as Colin Brown who suggested I read NTPG. I’ve read just about every book Wright has put out since then (I think I missed his Y2K volume, but not much more). His take on Jesus and the First Century world has deeply shaped my preaching and teaching. Along with others, I’m eagerly awaiting his next Big Book.
Sources of the Self – Charles Taylor was another philosopher I discovered while in graduate school. Where MacIntyre writes as an insightful critic of modernity, Taylor writes as an insightful acquaintance, neither friend nor foe. Beyond Sources of the Self, many of Taylor’s papers and other books have shaped my thinking also.

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When Things Go Wrong

Posted on April 1, 2010 by Richard Heyduck

Some people are optimists. They’re the folks who always expect good thing to happen. They see a silver lining in even the darkest days.

Some people are pessimists. Like Eeyore, Winnie the Pooh’s friend, they expect disaster right around the corner. However good things are right now, they’re sure it won’t last. Reality is about to jump out and bite them. Pessimists often deny the term, preferring to call themselves “realists.” Ron Heifetz describes this as a strategy of protecting oneself from any disappointment.

Have you ever been disappointed? I bet some of you are going through disappointments – even major ones – right now. You expected things, sometimes events, maybe your life as a whole, to turn out one way, but that way has never happened. Or if it did, what you expected to be good has been anything but.

Jesus’ disciples expected the best from Jesus. They’d heard his teaching. They’d seen his miracles. They’d seen him win encounter after encounter with the Pharisees and Sadduccees. They knew he was the one who would redeem Israel.

But then disaster struck. He was arrested. Hey, that’s no problem. He escaped every other predicament he’d been in. He’ll make it out this time, too. What? He’s not escaped yet? He’s on trial? He’s been convicted? They’re going to crucify him? Jesus – the one we thought was the Messiah – is dead? How could it be? We know for sure what’s coming next. The police will be coming after us. They’ll track us down, torture us and kill us. That’s what they always do to the folks who try to stand up for God.

Perhaps you’ve noted that transition in expectations in the Gospels.

The disciples were right to recognize the days as dark. Hard to get much darker than a brutal death. They were right to not venture into the la-la land that said something like, “Well, Jesus is in a better place now. He was just too good for this world.” Such a trip to la-la land completely misses what God was up to. Jesus came into the world knowing full well that the days were dark. At his baptism this non-sinner took upon himself the sins of humanity, setting himself up to absorb their consequences. He’d told the disciples that death awaited him in Jerusalem. They just never got it.

But death wasn’t the end for Jesus. The forces of sin, death and hell didn’t get the last word with him. God got the last word with Jesus, and his word was Live!

Whether you reckon yourself an optimist, a pessimist, a realist – or whatever – God’s word to you is Live! We find that life today through faith in the crucified and risen Jesus. Live in him.

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Thanks! – Children

Posted on March 26, 2010 by Richard Heyduck

https://banditsnomore.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/dsc00578.jpgI don’t remember ever giving any thought to having children while I was growing up. But when Christi and I got married there was no doubt that we planned to have children.

But which ones? There are so many models available these days, with new ones coming out every day!

Two of our children are out of high school now, and another will soon be there. I hope I’ve been good for my children. I know they’ve been good for me.

I think the main thing I’ve learned from my kids is to loosen up with my sense of humor. Their presence in the family has really opened my up. I’m sure I wouldn’t be half the pastor and teacher I am, were it not for my children. They’ve taught me many lessons in communication (unintentionally), though I’m afraid I embarrass them from time to time when we’re out in public. But I tell them that’s part of a parent’s job description.

My children are a great blessing to me. I pray that God will bless them, direct them in His ways, and employ them for Kingdom purposes from now and into Eternity.

Thanks, Kids!

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Non-Fans?

Posted on March 25, 2010 by Richard Heyduck

One of the books I’m reading now is Neil Cole’s Organic Leadership: Leading Naturally Right Where You Are. If you’re a committed proponent of traditional ways of doing, structuring and leading church, don’t read this book. Keep it far away. In fact, you’d better do that with all Cole’s books. If you’re open to improving your leadership and becoming more effective for the Kingdom, check it out.

In the first chapter Cole says,

The church in the West functions in a pattern similar to that of a dysfunctional relationship. It is locked up in an unhealthy cycle in which the Christian leaders and the regular Christians are codependents. The Christians who are not the church leaders prefer not to take responsibility for the kingdom of God. They want to be free to invest in their own plans rather than Gods. They are the irresponsible party [like the alcoholic or drug addict] in the dysfunctional relationship.

The Christian leaders [that’s us pastors], on the other hand, want to be responsible – to a fault. They continue to do all the work of the church, when enables other Christians to be irresponsible. Leaders need to be needed and admired, and often this is the result when they take all the responsibility for kingdom work.

Pastors do all the work of the church? No way! We have Finance and Trustee people that do tons of work. They handle the money, manage the property, make big, important decisions all the time. Surely my theory that Cole is speaking to pastors here is misguided, surely the church has many more leaders.

My reading is that in traditional churches we have too often reduced “church work” to finances, property and management of other resources. We then pass that work off to the non-pastors while we do what we call Kingdom work, the work that seeks to directly influence people for Jesus. Pastors do the ministry, while the laity do the ADministry. Surely you have seen that pattern if you’ve been around traditional churches any length of time.

As long as churches have buildings, property and employees – and the money to maintain them – we’ll need people gifted in management. I don’t want to sell those gifts and callings short. But I don’t want to be part of a system that presupposes that that kind of work is all non-pastors can do.

In my church I have the role of pastor. In that role I have certain responsibilities. Those responsibilities do not include doing all the

Preaching
Teaching
Visiting
Encouraging
Praying
Evangelizing
Spiritual Stuff

The more of these things we give away, the more we equip or allow our people to do, the better. It’s better for the Kingdom since there are more workers in the harvest field. It’s better for the people since they get to experience the joy of seeing God at work in their lives. It’s better for the pastors since they are relieved from the burden of doing (or feeling like they need to do) everything.

If you’ve tried giving the ministry away, you’ve experienced the resistance Cole mentions. If you’re like me, you’ve felt it in yourself. Little phrases like, “If you want it done right, do it yourself,” or “I’m the one being held accountable here” may have flitted through your mind.

Perhaps you’ve also experienced resistance from church people who expect you to do everything. “That’s why we pay you! We have busy lives. You have the education and the calling, so go do it. You can give us a report when you’re done, if you like. When we hear complaints we’ll be sure and let you know.” If we don’t really hear phrases like those, we imagine that we do.

It at this point that we need to break free of our co-dependency, our need to be needed, our need for everyone to like us. We can learn from Ben Arment’s comment on allowing a “non-fan” base. Not everyone is going to like us our our ways of doing things. We can kill ourselves over their disapproval, whether real or perceived, whether passive or aggressive, or we can become apathetic. There’s no way we can make everyone happy. Jesus surely didn’t, and if he didn’t, why do we expect to do better? Jesus was so in love with the Father, so committed to the mission of seeking and saving the lost, that that passion (that pathy) made room for apathy in other areas.

“Jesus, Jesus! The Pharisees were upset by what you said?” Did Jesus care? check out Matthew 23 sometime.

“Jesus, your mother and brothers and sisters are outside. They want you to come out to them. ” Did Jesus care? “Who is my mother? Who are my brothers and sisters? The ones who do the will of my Father, that’s who.”

Can’t you hear the passionate, love-driven, apathy?

I know my own weaknesses in this area. I have a lot still to learn, plenty of room for improvement. But I’m choosing the Jesus way, whether it generates a fan base or not. I want his Kingdom purposes to prevail in my life and ministry.

Posted in Discipleship, Ministry | Leave a comment

Thanks! Christi

Posted on March 24, 2010 by Richard Heyduck

https://banditsnomore.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/christiatfw.jpgChristi and I have been married just over twenty five years. If I’d kept on the same trajectory I’d been on through my growing up years and beginning of college, I probably wouldn’t be married today. I was just too shy – especially around girls. Raised in a family of boys, I hadn’t spent much time around them.

But at college Christi decided I was someone worth talking to and getting to know. Since she was gentle in her approach I wasn’t scared away. While I have not yet figured out females, I did figure out that marriage to her would be a good thing. So here we are.

Christi has been an encouragement all along the way. When I’ve felt like giving up at some point along the way, she’d tell me to keep going. When I needed help, she’s always been there.

One area I’ve always needed help is in my written communication. Since we were engaged for two years, and apart for much of that time, we wrote letters to each other pretty much every day. This gave her extensive practice reading my handwriting (I won the Gutenberg Award in high school biology class for having the handwriting that led them to invent the printing press). Now when I need my writing interpreted, proofed, edited or corrected, she’s able to do it far better than I can.

After all these years I’m still an introvert. I’m (usually) happy being an introvert. But I am much less shy than I used to be (my church people hardly believe it of me now), and I have to give most of the credit for that to Christi. Knowing her and being married to her all these years has helped me open up on many levels.

I’ll mention one last influence Christi has had on me. This one’s probably the most important. Mercy is one of Christi’s spiritual gifts. If you have that gift you know how painful that gift can be, not just because you can never meet all the needs you see, but also because you never want to tell people “no,” but sometimes you have to. I don’t have the gift of mercy, but I’ve learned a tremendous amount about mercy and compassion from Christi. I am much more gentle in my thoughts toward people than when I was young. When I was young and saw someone doing something stupid or destructive, I’d think to myself (fortunately, being shy, I almost never said it out loud, “There goes an idiot” – or something to that effect). I observed Christi in the presence of people acting like that and her comment was, “They must be having a bad day.” Through that and similar influences, she has molded my character to be more Christi-like. (As authors sometimes say, “Any defects that remain are purely of my own making.”)

Thanks, Christi!

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Thanks! Nancey Murphy

Posted on March 23, 2010 by Richard Heyduck

When I finished college, I took a couple of weeks off and went straight to seminary. Both were good experiences for me. In college I finally learned how to be a good student. More importantly, I found a good wife (or rather, she found me). In seminary I learned the basics of ministry and deepened my relationship with God. I liked school. I was good at it. But after six and a half straight years with little let up, I was tired. I was ready to spend some time in the “real world.”

My first “real world” posting was to the Queen City – Bloomburg circuit. I discovered that my seminary course in Mission Anthropology was the most useful. After a couple of years there, I served as an associate at Cedar Bayou UMC in Baytown. My calling all along was to ministry in higher education. The real world experience, I thought, would make my academic work not merely academic.

I did my PHD at Fuller Seminary under the guidance of Nancey Murphy. I’d never heard of her before I arrived at Fuller, but after my first semester I discovered that her research interests in a Christianity that was faithful to Jesus and strong enough to overcome the weaknesses imported to the church from modern philosophy, paralleled my own. Her church background (Roman Catholic, Charismatic movement, Church of the Brethren) was quite different from my own, but the Jesus connection was enough.

Nancey, in teaching and conversation, stimulated my thinking and work over the next several years. More important, however, was her encouragement. As one who had to work a full time job (and a couple of part time jobs) while trying to be a full time student, and maintain my family, life was fairly stressful. Living in California was expensive, and even working as much as I was I was going deeper into debt every month. After finishing my course work and passing my comps and language exams, it was tempting to just give up – to settle for an ABD. But Nancey kept encouraging me. She thought I could not only complete my dissertation, but do it well. Her encouragement was certainly part of what kept me going.

Thanks, Nancey, for the encouragement. Thanks also, for modeling fine scholarship that serves the church and lifts up Jesus.

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