Coram Deo Blog
Archive for October 2007
31 October 2007 at 11:32 am by Kendal Haug · humor
This will hopefully be a weekly feature of random observations on the city and culture of Omaha from the perspective of a life-long Texan. Literature has many different genres, all of which must be understood to know the meaning and intent of said literature. You can classify these musings as being Hyper Criticism, meaning I will be railing against the many things I notice that I simply don’t understand. Please feel free to enlighten me. The first set of observations will be focused on the transportation woes I have experienced around the fine city of Omaha.
1) Where are all the good radio stations in Omaha?
I mean seriously, where are they located at on the dial, as in, what is their frequency? I have yet to find any, and no, NPR doesn’t count — the ‘N’ stands for National, which means that everyone gets that station. I asked Walker yesterday this exact question, and he was happy to write down a few AM stations for me and only had one FM station to add to the list. I was leaving the office yesterday and decided to see what this ballyhooed FM location had to offer. I hit the tune button, located the correct frequency, and was immediately bombarded by the vocal soarings of Kelly Clarkson. Yea, thanks Walker!
2) What is the deal with all of the two lane exits?
Do you really need more than one lane of a road in order to properly execute an exit from any given highway? This is a new phenomenon to me, and I just don’t understand. It has caused some near collisions for me as I have anxiously tried to swerve left to avoid the “must exit” lane at the last second. Why have two, when one is really all you need?
3) Why is the middle octane at the gas station actually cheaper than the lower grade?
This would be like charging more $ for a plain donut than one with cinnamon icing and multi-colored sprinkles. I mean who doesn’t want multi-colored sprinkles? I noticed that this middle grade gas is comprised of 10% ethanol, which truthfully sounds quite alarming to me. Is ethanol safe for my car? This all just sounds like marketing 101 to me.
4) What is up with the middle lane on Dodge that goes both ways depending on what time of day it is?
I have never heard of this, but it sounds just like a super idea: “Let’s make a traffic lane that will create the possibility of 2 one-ton-piles-of-rolling-metal heading directly at each other at speeds that will produce enough force to kill all parties involved.” Now that’s critical thinking!
5) Who decided that it would be a good idea to create numbered streets right next to the same corresponding numbered avenue?
And don’t get me started on trying to find an address like 152nd Ave Cir. There can be only one suffix to a road name, period. This is just a flawed idea at its core, and I don’t feel that any further explanation is needed.
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25 October 2007 at 10:40 pm by Bob Thune · masculinity
A recent post on masculine spirituality generated a firestorm of comments and opened a lively dialogue on issues of masculinity and femininity. Though some comments seemed to focus on tangential issues, the debate itself does beg for a more thorough articulation of matters related to God and gender. This post is an attempt at setting a foundation for further discussion.
Here, then are some “bullet point” summaries of biblical truths related to God and gender.
1. God is Spirit; therefore he is not contained within a human body and is neither male nor female (John 1:18, 4:24, 6:46; Num 23:19).
2. Humanity is created in God’s image and therefore maleness and femaleness both reflect the image of God in different and unique ways. Men bear the image of God in a distinctly masculine way, and women bear the image of God in a distinctly feminine way. Genesis 1:26-27: Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.” So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.
3. Men and women are equal as image-bearers of God. But they play different roles in the working out of God’s purposes on earth. The charge given to the first man and woman was multiplication and dominion – “fill the earth and subdue it” (Gen 1:28). The man’s role seems to fall more heavily on the dominion side of the mandate – subduing the earth by the sweat of his brow (Genesis 1:28, 2:15-25; 3:17-20). The woman’s role seems to fall more heavily on the multiplication side of the mandate – the bearing and raising of children (Genesis 1:28, 3:16). Obviously neither role is possible without the other; they are complimentary, which is why the union of man and woman in marriage provides the clearest picture of God’s image in humanity (Genesis 2:24).
4. God uses masculine pronouns to refer to himself throughout Scripture. This is obviously not because God is anatomically male (see point 1). Rather, it seems to be because God wants to emphasize his headship and authority over all creation; as the man is the head of a marriage, so God is the head of everything in creation (1 Cor 11:3; 1 Tim 2:12-13). John Frame writes: “Scripture wants us to think of God as Lord… Since in the Biblical view women are subject to male authority in the home and the church, there is some awkwardness in speaking of God in female terms.”
5. When the second person of the Trinity stepped into human history in the Incarnation, he took on human form as a man – Jesus of Nazareth. Again, this is not because manhood is superior in some way to womanhood. It is presumably because the role Jesus was to play in redemption – the role of rescuing humanity from ruin and faithfully executing the demands of covenant headship, reversing the failure of Adam – is a distinctly masculine role. It was a man’s abdication of headship that got us into this mess in the first place (Genesis 3:1-7; Romans 5:12). It is Jesus’ faithfulness as our covenant head that puts things right (Romans 5:17; 1 Cor 15:45-49).
In answer, then, to the question, “How should we think of God?” a number of points may be adduced:
a) It is appropriate to worship God for both his masculine qualities such as protector (Psalm 121:7), provider (Genesis 22:14), fighter (Psalm 3:7), defender (Isaiah 38:6), and Savior (2 Samuel 22:3), as well as his feminine qualities such as comforting (Psalm 23:4), helping (Psalm 54:4), and being tender (Isaiah 40:11) and compassionate (Psalm 25:6). [This is not to say that women never fight or defend, or that men are never tender and compassionate. I will assume some measure of common sense from the reader here to allow me to speak about what are generally considered masculine or feminine traits across time and culture - traits which are rooted, of course, in our divine design.]
b) However, it would be inappropriate to think of God as female, because this is contrary to God’s self-revelation in Scripture.
c) The opposite, however, is not true. Because God came to earth as a man, it is appropriate for us to think of Jesus as male and to worship him for his faithful masculine covenant headship which is the ground of our salvation.
d) Jesus is the consummate masculine leader – the perfect Man – and therefore our view of true masculinity should start with him. All godly men should seek to emulate Jesus.
e) Because Jesus was not just the perfect man, but the perfect human, he also sets the bar for godly women. Jesus’ submission to the Father models what a woman’s submission to male headship should look like. Godly women should seek to emulate the spirit and example of Jesus.
f) Furthermore, Scripture gives us both male and female role models to emulate. The virtues of courage (Joshua 1:1-9), sacrifice (Ephesians 5:25), and hard work/provision (1 Tim 5:8; 2 Thess 3:7-12) are held up as some of the marks of godly masculinity. Peter specifically mentions the virtue of submission as a mark of godly femininity (1 Peter 3:1-7). While our definitions of masculinity and femininity will certainly be influenced by our cultural presuppositions, it does seem that God has given us a relatively clear outline of masculinity and femininity, rooted in his own creation order which ordained that men and women should bear his image in distinct yet complimentary ways.
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7 October 2007 at 9:18 pm by Bob Thune · legalism
This week in our journey through Romans, we talked about matters of sin vs. matters of conscience (Romans 14). There are weak Christians – those with more sensitive consciences on disputable things – and there are strong Christians – those who have a more fully developed understanding of how to live all of life to the glory of God.
I listed some issues of conscience – disputable matters that good and godly people disagree on. What would you add?
Is drinking alcohol in moderation OK? Or should God-honoring Christians abstain entirely?
What music or movies should Christians enjoy or abstain from?
Which Bible translation is best?
Should faithful Christians celebrate Halloween or not (due to its pagan roots)?
What sort of dress is “proper” for church?
What political movements should Christians support or oppose?
Any thoughts on the issues on this list – or on additional ones that come to mind?
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7 October 2007 at 3:14 pm by Bob Thune · masculinity
Here’s just one reason why we host a men’s retreat every year focused on masculine spiritual leadership:
Every time I breathe You seem a little bit closer
I never want to leave
I want to stay in Your warm embrace
Oh basking in the glory shining from Your face
And every time I get another glimpse of Your heart
I realize it’s true
That You are so marvelous…
And I am so in love with You
(from the song “Every Time I Breathe” by Big Daddy Weave)
The word “God” belongs where the ellipsis is. But take that word out, and this pretty much sounds like a love song that a man would sing to a woman. And it’s just weird to sing to God the same words you would sing to a woman.
Should Christian men love God? Yes. Should we cultivate a healthy, affective faith – one that involves our hearts as well as our heads? Yes. But think about it: would a godly man sing these words to another man? Naw. And Jesus is a (resurrected and glorified) man. So why would we sing songs to him that we would never think of singing to another human man?
In a day and age when this is a “normal” Christian song, it should be clear that we have some work to do in order to recover a healthy, biblical, masculine spirituality. That’s the purpose behind our gathering a few weeks from now.
[No offense intended to Big Daddy Weave. I have generally found them to be a pretty decent band. Maybe someone else wrote this song for them?]
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2 October 2007 at 8:49 pm by Bob Thune · gospel, materials
One of our core values at Coram Deo is that The Gospel Changes Everything. What we mean by that is that 1) the gospel transforms people in their entirety (not just their eternal destinies) and that therefore 2) everything has to do with the gospel – work, leisure, family, church, money, sex, friendships, decisions – everything. The gospel is not just the ABC’s of the Christian life, but the A to Z. You don’t start with the gospel and then move on to something else. The gospel is the power of God for both salvation and sanctification.
Unfortunately much of the Christian marketing industry works against the centrality of the gospel by leveraging the lure of the “next best thing.” There is always a new program, a fresh fad, an inventive understanding of prophecy, a shortcut for spiritual formation, or ten steps to something. But very little that has anything to do with the gospel and its transforming power.
Earlier this year, the pastoral team at Coram Deo wrote 9 weeks’ worth of small group content called The Gospel-Centered Life. It is based heavily on some discipleship material called Sonship (published by World Harvest Mission in Philadelphia). We took WHM’s basic concepts (blended with a little Tim Keller and some John Frame) and re-wrote them in an interactive, conversational format that would work better for Coram Deo’s missional community structure. Then we sent our stuff off to World Harvest to get permission for the concepts we borrowed and to see if they’d be interested in publishing it.
The good news is: the good people at World Harvest are considering the material for publication. The better news is: while they do so, they’ve invited us to disseminate the GCL material as far and wide as we’d like, providing that no one charges money for it.
So we’re linking it here, in PDF format. Many of you who read this blog are from other parts of the country, serving Christ in other churches and ministry contexts, and perhaps looking for some good small-group content. If this stuff can be of use to you: put it to work! Just give credit where credit is due, and don’t go making money off it.
May Jesus be made famous and may his people be set free to delight in Him.
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