Professionals, Metrics and Calvinism

A while back Stepchild posted about M's who do not belong on the field. I took it not as an indictment of certain people, but as a warning of behaviors and attitudes to be aware of. His description of the Professional caught my attention because I recognized in his critique a tendency to which I am particularly susceptible.

In my former life I was a UNIX systems administrator. My experience taught me to be both flexible and task-oriented - the successful administrator is able to have several medium- to long-term projects simmering on the back burner constantly, working on each when opportunity arises, yet is able to drop everything to respond to an emergency.

The problem I have found is that I have tended to approach ministry at my church the same way. I have projects in mind constantly, so that at any time I have several things I could be doing. I can be flexible enough to adjust my schedule as real ministry needs arise, but my focus remains fixed on projects because of one thing: metrics.

I have an insatiable need to get things done. To be able to cross something off my list and say, "Done!" In fact, I measure my effectiveness by it. When I am "accomplishing" things, I feel I'm doing well, because that's how my effectiveness as a sysadmin was measured. But... as a minister of the Gospel (in some way), what have I really accomplished?

The need for metrics is not reserved to former techies. Pastors and M's do it too, in the form of counting filled pews, or baptisms, or VBS participants, or mission trips taken. It's the need for metrics, in my mind, that drives legalism ancient and modern. The Pharisees made up a bunch of rules precisely to measure their effectiveness. In some ways, we Baptists do the same thing. We all do.

So... not to throw any stones or anything, but is this why some of the more, um, metrics-oriented leaders in the SBC are so vehemently opposed to the idea that God chooses His elect? (full disclosure: I am not a Calvinist. Calvin got more than a couple things wrong. But predestination he got right.) The common rhetoric one hears is that Calvinism stifles missions. There's anecdotal evidence to support the assertion: some Calvinist churches don't do missions at all. But there's such a strong history of Calvinist missions and missionaries (remember the Great Awakening? All those guys were Calvinists) that the stereotype falls apart.

What is plain to me is that the people who say such things cannot imagine why they would be missional themselves if the whole thing were up to God's sovereign choice anyway. Their concept of salvation is wrapped up in the idea of something we do, which is, by the way, why they get caught up in regulating the things other Christians do.

I believe in predesination because I believe God to be sovereign in every way. It is my faith in His sovereignty that is leading me to follow His Great Commission to go to the nations. He is my Adonai, my master and lord. But because He is sovereign, I also have the grace to not worry about metrics. It's not up to me to get the job done. Salvation is His alone - I just go.

A Word Of Caution

I'm new to this whole blog thing, but my wife reminds me from time to time to be careful when on my soapbox, so... It's time for a word of caution. Mostly for me, but also to many of you out there in Blogville.

I just read a great post on Joe Thorn's blog, Words of Grace, about contextualization. Joe wrote about the issue of contextualizing the Gospel without watering it down, and how it's easy to speak of contextualization on the mission field, but harder in your own home town.

What caught my eye was the commentary from all of us in Bloggerland congratulating Joe on his great post, and how sad it is that so many Baptists out there are scared of the term "contextualization," and how, unlike us, they just don't understand that contextualization is a good and necessary part of evangelism.

I catch myself thinking the same thoughts from time to time. "Why can't they understand? Don't they get it?" Or a quote from me last Sunday over coffee, "I have to question whether anyone who voted for that resolution really understands the Gospel at all."

But the truth is, to the extent they don't understand the fullness of God's glory and mission, we don't really "get it" either. And I was in the same place theologically not so long ago. And yet God was even then molding me, challenging me to stretch my view of Him and His work. Am I to think that I have reached the pinnacle of grace and maturity, that I have no more to learn? Perish the thought!

Instead, I turn again to Romans 14:1-4, 9-12:

1Accept him whose faith is weak, without passing judgment on disputable matters. 2One man's faith allows him to eat everything, but another man, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. 3The man who eats everything must not look down on him who does not, and the man who does not eat everything must not condemn the man who does, for God has accepted him. 4Who are you to judge someone else's servant? To his own master he stands or falls. And he will stand, for the Lord is able to make him stand.
. . .
9For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that he might be the Lord of both the dead and the living. 10You, then, why do you judge your brother? Or why do you look down on your brother? For we will all stand before God's judgment seat. 11It is written:
" 'As surely as I live,' says the Lord,
'every knee will bow before me;
every tongue will confess to God.' " 12So then, each of us will give an account of himself to God."

When God called me and my family to ministry outside of my local church context, it didn't take me long to start judging those who seemed happy to stay right where they were. "Don't they understand that we're called to Go?" I wondered. "Their complacency demonstrates that they just don't get what the Gospel is all about."

Yet the Lord has shown me clearly (and humiliatingly) that I was wrong to judge. In fact, many of the people I dismissed so quickly are right where God wants them to be right now, doing the work He has for them to do, and giving Him glory for it. Their ministry provided the fertile ground through which called called my family to ministry, and is even now calling us to take the Gospel to those far outside our church. Many of the ones I judged, in fact, are right now more spiritually mature than I may ever be.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying we ought not debate these things, and strive for the truth, and judge for ourselves which is the best way. But for all of us, especially me, a little humility goes a long way.

The Subversive Church, Part One

I have thought to myself, before joining the blog craze, that I would someday write a book about the Subversive Church. It's been an idea bouncing around in my head for at least a year now - and believe me, there's lots of room in there to bounce.

It started in a discussion I was having over William Cavanaugh's excellent exploration of liberation theology in Pinochet's Chile, Torture and Eucharist. The problem I have always had with liberation theology is that, whatever its quasi-biblical basis, its means and ends are always entirely political. As though salvation can be achieved by overthrowing an oppressor. As though salvation of a people or nation or community, as opposed to an individual believer, has any meaning.

And yet Cavanaugh makes an excellent point in his study of the Roman Catholic church in Chile, and its response to the brutality of the Pinochet regime. The local church tried for years to remain aloof of local politics, asserting time and again that its concern was for the spiritual welfare of its parishioners, that it could not become entangled in political, or even worse, revolutionary struggle. Yet to remain aloof required the church to stand by while its members and certain other "undesirables" of its community were beaten, tortured and killed.

It was easy at first for me to make the case that the biblical demand is that, yes, we stay out of politics in the church, even at the cost of our lives. But the memory of Nazi Germany gave me pause. I have wondered many times how the church in Germany could stand by silently while Hitler exterminated millions of innocents, even continuing to baptize and administer ordinances to Hitler's army. Their silence was worse than neutral - it was complicit, perhaps even cowardly. The church in Germany should have done something. But what?

I found Cavanaugh's account of Chile to give part of the answer. Subversion. The church is not (or should not be) a political body - it can't meet the government head on. But it can follow its own agenda, not by fighting the policies of the oppressive regime, but by ignoring them. When Pinochet's men tortured someone, the church provided sanctuary and free medical care. When the church learned of a torture facility, they sent people to stand outside with signs that read, "Torture is being done here." They wrote letters, took video, publicized the whole thing. They did not fight Pinochet's regime, they subverted it. They determined to minister to the people in the very teeth of tyranny.

Interestingly, the local diocese in Chile received opposition to its efforts not only from Pinochet, but also from Rome. To be true to its calling to "be Christ" to the local community, the church in Chile was forced into a subversive role toward not only the secular power of its government, but also the religious authority of its denomination. They did not openly oppose the rulings handed down from Rome, but found ways to minister with integrity despite them.


The key to my understanding of what motivated the local church in Chile to flout both secular and religious authority in order to serve its community is integrity. The individual men and women in Chile who made that decision were bound to obey not Pinochet, and not the Pope, but Jesus Christ. They made a collective decision to subvert their organizational authority in the name of Christ.

I know, this is dangerous talk. But it's one with a long and glorious tradition in the history of the Church. How, I wonder, does the idea of subversion apply to our current situation in the Baptist church?

Welcome to Blogville, population: Us.

Ok, so I really got here because I wanted to post a comment on stepchild's blog, missionsmisunderstood.blogspot.com. But to comment you have to set up a blogger account, and I just hit this little button, and then this big screen opened up, and then I was choosing a template, and then AAAAAAAGGGGgggghhhh.... ... .. . . . . (thud) - here I am. A blogger. Nuts!

But you know, I was probably going to do this someday anyway. So if anyone ever reads this, here's a quick primer on what my blog - The Subversive Church - is all about.

1. The title. This is something I've been turning over in my head for a while. I plan to post again in a few days with what exactly I mean by "subversive church."

2. I think blogs are awesome. I've never blogged before now, but I've been an avid reader for some time. Blogs in many ways represent the essence of postmodernity. They do not pretend to objectivity. They are biased, skewed and slanted in as many ways as there are bloggers. And so one cannot find objective truth by reading one blog alone.

Ah, but one never does read a single blog alone! The point of blogs is that they network. Not only do we tend to read multiple blogs to begin with, but blogs invite commentary, which gives immediate feedback on the validity of a post. I could post something outrageous, like, "Charles Woodson deserved the Heisman." Which everyone knows is false, because Peyton Manning was clearly the better player. But you'd see that in the comments, and so my outrageous post wouldn't live long. And I would lose my blog-cred.

Furthermore, blogs link. My favorite news blog is Instapundit. It's so much better than traditional media because it links to every story, so I can check out the original source myself, and see if I buy what the guy's saying about it. And if there's a correction, or the story is bogus, the mod will post updates or retractions almost instantly. Instapundit has a high degree of blog-cred with me.

3. Finally, I'm really interested in exploring what the Church is doing with this whole blog thing. The group which represents the denomination of which my church is a member just had their annual convention, and some big shots said some nasty things about blogs and bloggers, which, if they wanted to keep me away from blogs, was the last thing they should have done. So now I'm finding a whole community of Christian bloggers I didn't know was there! Sweet. Besides, it supports my theory of Church-as-subversion.

So anyway, there you have it. The Subversive Church. Enjoy!