All posts by Rod Heggy

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Rod’s Top Ten List of Things Christians Got…

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ROD’S TOP TEN LIST OF THINGS CHRISTIANS GOT BECAUSE THEY WENT BEYOND THE SCRIPTURES

10. Things Christians got because they went beyond the Scriptures: kneelers!

9. Things Christians got because they went beyond the Scriptures: “survival of the fittest” as a statement of morality, just like in American Idol.

8. Things Christians got because they went beyond the Scriptures: church pews!! [Luke 12:37: “will have them recline ….” (NIV)] [How many pews do you see where the minister is supposed to sit, hmmm?]

7. Things Christians got because they went beyond the Scriptures: church mortgages! [Rom 13:8: “Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another,…” (NIV)]

6. Things Christians got because they went beyond the Scriptures: church board meetings! [Titus 1:5-9]

5. Things Christians got because they went beyond the Scriptures: ear dandruff! [2 Tim. 4:3]

4. Things Christians got because they went beyond the Scriptures: door to door sales persons! [2 Tim. 3:6]

3. Things Christians got because they went beyond the Scriptures: no more pot luck dinners!! [1 Cor. 11:21]

2. Things Christians got because they went beyond the Scriptures: leftovers!! [1 Cor. 8:10]

1. Things Christians got because they went beyond the Scriptures: very boring baptisms!! [Acts 8:36: As they traveled along the road, they came to some water…Acts 8:38: Then both Philip and the eunuch went down into the water…” (NIV) – no where does it say they went down into the tiled chlorinated tub of heated water!]

Preaching

What Ever Happened to Sermons?

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In the legal profession, lawyers are held to ethical and legal standards that at times are open to interpretation. Nevertheless, there are standards, and some of them form objective criteria for evaluation of conduct. Also, lawyers are subject to other measures of performance, including for trial lawyers, winning and losing. For transaction attorneys, deal closure, or the failure thereof, seems to be a meaningful standard, too.

But what about the preaching ministry? What are the Biblical, ethical or ecumenical standards that apply? Truthfully, regardless of denomination, whatever standards are taught, they are either not enforced or they are so subjective that they are of no benefit.

Unlike some observers, I have spent several years in the pulpit. The standards taught to me were simple and straightforward, but applied with discipline, they provided a straight line. Jim Avery taught me about the discipline of preparation. Terry Hull taught me the discipline of presentation from prepared materials without ad lib or extemporaneous deviation from the planned presentation. Thus, what I preached always had a Biblical basis as sound as my understanding of the Scriptures informed by my research both of the text and secondary authorities. My sermons were my own, guided by the Holy Spirit. I did take the license to clone a couple from Mr. Hull, but even then I worked them up as if they were my own and did not deviate from the discipline of preparation or presentation. Both Mr. Avery and Mr. Hull made it clear to me that advance preparation in the study was more likely to be Holy Spirit-driven than improvisations during worship services. The Holy Spirit either did not need improvisation or could provide it a day or more in advance. The Holy Spirit might think the commentators down through the ages did enough improvisation.

Lately, however, I have sat in many worship services in more than one denomination and heard sermons that were transparent in the poverty of preparation and presented as post hoc rationalizations rather than faithfully prepared presentations of the Scriptures. Do these ministers think no one is listening, and therefore the quality of their work does not matter? Do these ministers think the Plan of Salvation is on automatic pilot and their efforts from the pulpit are not needed? Continue reading What Ever Happened to Sermons? →

Israel/Middle East

“Hamastan!”

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The election of Hamas to the government of Palestine is both terrifying and intriguing. “Binyamin Netanyahu, the Likud Party leader and former Israeli prime minister, said Israel shouldn’t be surprised by the Hamas victory – the establishment of “Hamastan,” he called it,” reported by CNSNews.com.

Hamas, an acronym which in Arabic also means “zeal” or “ardor,” was founded in 1988 and quickly adopted as the military arm of the Muslim Brotherhood in Palestine. Tessler, A History of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict (Indiana 1994), at 694, et. seq. It was financially supported by Saudi Arabia and others. Hamas’ charter of thirty-six articles makes it clear that nationalism and religious faith are intertwined such that for that reason no territory in Palestine may be left in the hands of non-Muslims. Further, Hamas’ charter spells out that there can be no solution to the Palestinian territorial claims except through Jihad. Hamas must engage in and promoter terrorism and warfare against Israel to fulfill its charter.

The election of Hamas to the government of Palestine will permit the international community to directly address Hamas’ commitment to warfare as the sole solution it will consider to its claims on Israel’s territory. Further, actions by Hamas can now be laid directly at the feet of Palestinian government and accountability might be more easily achieved. By going legitimate, Hamas might be forced to divorce its actions from its rhetoric in order to remain in legitimate power.

However, it is possible Hamas will drag the Palestinians back down the path of warfare and humiliation that have plagued those Arab nations with implacable designs on the territory of Israel. Those Arab nations were defeated by Israel in 1948, 1967, 1973 and throughout the 1980s and 1990s. After each conflict, the Arab nations that participated in warfare with Israel lost their military establishments, lost territory to Israeli occupation, and were humiliated. Israel has incrementally vacated territory taken in these wars in exchange for peace with those Arab Nations. Hamas, on the other hand, arrogantly believes it can better the record of those Arab Nations and refuses to face the fact that if its theology is true, Allah’s will has been clearly announced.

If Hamas fails to go legitimate, if it embroils the Palestinians in another military confrontation with the Israelis, Hamas is more likely to set back Palestinian aspirations for another century, and maybe, irreparably. If Hamas continues to bring about confrontation with the United States, Hamas may be forced to join the Taliban in the twilight of history.

Politics, Christians in

Christians Not a Cohesive Voting Block

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This post was written in response to Terry Hull’s post, “They Will Know We Are Christians by Our…Politics?” (01/21/06).
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Terry, as a committed and avowed independent, registered neither as a Republican or a Democrat, it has always amused me to watch Christians attempt to mingle politics with faith. Most Christians would probably be independents unless they were seeking involvement in a party for personal or platform reasons. Our Arab/Islamic counterparts and our Jewish counterparts have grown up with integrated politics as a societal norm and probably we could learn a thing or two from them.

Most Christians are being dragged to the ballot box by one moral issue or another, but have not developed a consistent political theory by which to vote or live. Thus, Christians as a group, are not able to avoid waivering and fluctuating both as to numbers and as to issue commitment. If that were not the case, the Christian majority would have asserted itself long ago and the resulting hegemony would have lasted for many years. But, no point in history seems to have such a consistent block of voters influencing policy for longer than a tiny span of years.

The abortion issue, as a case in point, will show fatigue, if it has not already, for Christians because Republicans seem unwilling or unable to regulate, license, tax, credential, or require net capital from abortionists or their entities, even though the Courts have been quite clear that they will not interfer with legitimate uses of police powers. The reason, of course, is that the Republicans might lose their anti-abortion voting block if the scourge of abortion was merely suppressed, even if abolition was denied them.
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UPDATE (01/19/06): In response to the above post, Terry Hull has written: “Coming Out of the Church House to Join the Conversation.”

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Rod’s Top Ten Church Errors of the Twentieth Century

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10. Allowing television evangelists on the air without regulating their hair stylists.
9. Allowing radio evangelists on the air without first conducting heresy inquisitions.
8. Allowing society to leap ahead of the church by requiring proficiency exams for doctors and lawyers but not requiring any competency testing for the salaried clergy.
7. Choosing people for church leadership on the basis of whether they are willing to serve communion and take up the offering, rather than whether they know Genesis from Revelation or faith from works.
6. Devoting a big chunk of the church’s missions budget to sending members on annual adventure excursions to foreign countries, even though most of the travelers don’t even bother to learn the language of the people they are ministering to.
5. Funding evangelism on an equal priority with the church’s lawn care needs.
4. Dropping the requirement that people wear formal dress to church, resulting in today’s preferences for shorts, jeans and T-shirts among everyone at every church event.
3. Attacking long hair on men as satanic (at least when I was a kid), while posting pictures of Jesus with hair longer than that of any rock star.
2. The church remains a rest home for believers rather than a hospital for sinners in which everyone enters through the emergency room.
1. The failure of the church to promote Pat Robertson to a suitable emeritus position.