Catholic Presbyterian

So I have lots of these moments...A few days back I was driving to the gym and at the back of the parking lot was a car with the hood up, next to it was parked another car. There were 3 people gazing down into the engine bay; 2 with somewhat inquisitive yet blank stares and the other was talking. The talking man was in his 30's and the older couple where most likely in their 60's. The funny part is i went into one of my mystery science theatre 3000 moments and immediatly began to imagine what that conversation could look like..."So mam if you will notice here" as the 30 year old is pointing to the starter "I have recently replaced the flux capacitor" the older couple looks at one another "thats a relief, you remember how much it cost to fix the last time our flux capacitor went out on the cadillac!" guy driving by in car laughs.
Its just so funny to me how people think that by "poppin' the hood" and "kickin the tires" they know what they are buying. The fact of the matter is the average person doesnt know what they are looking at under the hood and what made that story so funny in the moment was just how realistic such an absurd scenario could be...LOL

In the modern evangelical church in America there are vast differences on what is considered to be "good worship" and what is not. Usually the "good worship" is distinguished from not so good, or even "bad worship", by the subjective affinities and predilections of the individual in conjunction with how they feel both during and after they leave public worship. As if this wasn't alarming enough, lets examine one of the widely held presuppositions or axioms of the American evangelical: personal autonomy. I will stipulatively define personal autonomy here in this way: The right to have the final word regarding what is biblical and how its to be understood and applied in the faith and life of the church. This is a truly democratic and individualistic approach, sadly it is also a radically unbiblical one. Since the average person in the pew does not actually have any ecclesiastical authority to implement their opinions upon every other "personally autonomous" worshipper in the Church, this ideology usually manifests itself in the modern fad of church shopping. You know the routine keep going from church to church until you find the one the one that most closely matches up with your idea of how you think things ought to be. I call this the wandering-one-man-magesterium-minstrel approach...mouthful huh? The ironic part of the story is that while all of this is in attempts to be free from tradition and inventions of men the average American evangelical just runs from one system of man made inventions to another. In an attempt to escape traditional or liturgical forms of worship that are supposedly dead or devoid of the Spirit, the average Christian is accepting that which is most culturally familiar to them and that which makes them feel good and is supposedly free of "tradition". Well Christians...somebody had to break the news to you sooner or later, so it might as well happen now...your service of worship at your local Church is most likely filled with traditions, all though they may only be traditions stemming back to the reformation, or the 20th century, or the so-called contemporary traditions(which is funny because its usually about 10-15 years behind the tide of the culture that people are in the other 6 days of the week), they are nonetheless traditions. Sadly these newer traditions often take there cues more from the affinities of the Church community, or perhaps a select few "staff" or members of the "worship team", and not the affinities or the expressed commands of the one being Worshiped, namely our Covenant God. All churches have a Liturgy, or way of ordering worship. Going to a so-called contemporary church one will be hard pressed to go in week after week and find little if any deviation from the previous weeks service regarding the order of worship. So the question naturally arises then... have you really escaped tradition? No! You have most likely substituted one set of traditions for the other based merely on your feelings at worse and your biblical convictions at best. This is the heart of sectarianism, the cancer of the Church. We must get back to the Bible and the Historic understandings of what worship is all about, or we will continue to run the risk of becoming like the folks that Paul was addressing in 1 Cor. 11:17-20, divisive Christians that aren't really practicing the true, Spirit filled, sacrificial and communal Worship of the Church. That is not freedom friends, that is bondage to our own concupiscent desires for personal autonomy, before the peace and unity of the Body of Christ, which is sin.

Joking about the title of the group, but seriously our group geared towards conversing about a biblical and meaningful ecumenism met at a fellow Reformed brothers house today. There where 4 Covenant Student, me(a future Covenant student), A former Covenant student that is Now Roman Catholic, A former PCA fellow that is almost in full communion with Rome, and a Lutheran fellow from Concordia Seminary. It was really a great time! Given that healthy ecumenism is the exchanging of gifts, not the watering down of distinctions or truth, i would definitely say we are a truly ecumenical group! The dialogue and discourse was healthy respectful and helpful. We are hoping to get an Anglican fellow and perhaps an Orthodox fellow as well. The format is loose but follows general crux issues such as perspectives on everything from Ecclesiology to Soteriology to Sacramentology. Today we touched on Justification, and it was good, although i would have like to have heard some more nuances touched on and from all sides represented. As a whole I'm very stoked! I love this kind of non-sectarian dialogue, its delightfully refreshing!
J

In a recent chat with a friend who had just broken up with her bf, i was made privy to the kind of spiritual formation the Church is implicitly catechising Her children in. This sister was grieving over the recently broken relationship. She then expressed to me how she knew she that she was in sin for not clinging to God in that moment, as though grieving and clinging to God were antithetical? It grieved me to see this sister in such pain, yet all she could worry about in the midst of it was if she was "slipping" into sin or not. This habit, I fear, is deeply ingrained in the piety of many in the evangelical Church in America. We have been taught that the Christian is always to be doing "well", not good "well". Don't believe me, walk up to a Christian on Sunday and ask them "how are you?" 9 times out of 10, without any consideration of reality, they will give the answer that they have been sociologically Catechised to give..."I'm doing Well..." and then immediately deflect the question back to the other person in like manner. This is an informal heresy that we as Christians have embraced, that i have chosen to call the theology of non-suffering. It goes something like this: Jesus suffered one time for all, Christians experience the application and benefits of that one time suffering by faith, and in that relationship between us and God we are being sanctified(with the emphasis on the fact that we are still sinners yet at the same time Justified), therefore we will suffer because we are still sinners, but that suffering has no real purpose to God, us or others, because the only suffering that really means anything already happened 2000 years ago on the cross, and to say that I'm suffering now, well that just doesn't compare therefore I'm doing "well". It usually manifests itself in a pious sounding response like "its nothing compared to Calvary" or something to that effect. This is really a stoic-no real meaningful response to pleasure or pain- pendulum response that at its core fatally flaws our Christian worldview. Beloved I encourage you to look to your union with Christ and see that the sufferings that you experience now have infinite value. We are the Body, He is our head. No disciple is greater than His master, we must desire to take up our cross and follow Him daily weeping all the way to the mount of death if necessary. Our sufferings are united with Christ's, as the rest of the human reality is as well thanks to the incarnation. Our temptations, joys, weaknesses, and love is all in union with Him. Let us suffer and not sin. Let us be joyful and not sin. Let us live our sufferings through Him, with Him, and in Him.

Hi everyone! So finally caved and started a blog...Many of you, you know who you are, have been telling me for years now to start a blog and i have resisted...until now!
The scope of this Blog will be everything from my daily ramblings to serious theological dialogue. Join in!