Spiritual Coffee: Barnabas Piper Leadership Podcasts (Spiritual Disciplines) - Sports Community Replaces Church - Richard John Neuhaus, Liberal and Orthodox?

Catching up on a week of interesting developments. Here are three of the most useful things I've come across to stimulate and sharpen your Christian thinking. As always, prior selections are under Spiritual Coffee.

5 Leadership Questions podcast: Spiritual Disciplines and Leadership, Todd Akins and Barnabas Piper (with Kevin Spratt)
The bonus here is discovering this podcast by Akins and Piper, which has weekly episodes where they "ask five questions of different guests or about different leadership topics. The aim of the podcast is to inform and encourage Christian leaders whether they serve in the pastorate, the business world, non-profits, or on a volunteer basis." This one has a valuable perspective on why we can't take the spiritual disciplines for granted, or get tired of them. Kind of like we shouldn't get tired of breathing or eating. Some things are so basic that you just can't opt out of them if you want life to work.
In addition to a useful concept, Akins and Piper have quotes from each episode posted below the player so you can skim what they talk about.

“Many times the delta between our knowledge and our application is immense.”“Without the fundamentals you don’t have anything to build off of.”
“There are some things that there simply isn’t a newer better way to do.”
“Character is as valuable now as it ever has been, and there aren’t different versions.”
“You can’t really innovate spiritual disciplines.”
“You can’t lead people in a direction you’re not going yourself.”

Check out the episode with Jon Acuff too. Good thoughts on developing yourself for success and staying away from moral failure.

“I try to surround myself with people who have the kind of lives I want to live.”“Hustle is an act of focus, not frenzy.”

Lessons from Cleveland's Religious Devotion to Its Teams, Ed Uszynski (Athletes in Action)
This is a remarkably well-written comparison that identifies the community-bonding and identity-formation aspects of the investment people have in their cities' sports teams. It contrasts how those aspects used to be served primarily by church community. There are some valuable observations here about what may be missing from our churches, as well as what we need to make sure we are getting from church instead of simply from sports and other recreational friendships.

"They actually fill a void previously filled by church attendance and the experience of being a church member. With the decline of institutional religion as an influential reality in communities across America, a key component of human development and one of the primary areas that Christian education used to fill—identity formation—has been taken over by sport culture."

The Liberalism of Richard John Neuhaus, Matthew Rose (National Affairs)
Neuhaus was founder and editor of the Christian magazine First Things, a commentary on religion and public life, up until his death. He is probably one of the most well-known voices addressing the absence of religion in the public square and civil government. He coined the phrase "the Naked Public Square" with his book in the 1980s, describing what had happened to social and civic discussions by the exclusion of 'religion' as an accepted aspect of those discussions. He was a great champion for the importance and appropriateness of religious thought being applied in society, politics, law, and education, but also a very wise and reasonable thinker who didn't suffer from the extremes that some Christians do in trying to 'put the Bible back in school.' He is a man well worth studying and knowing. It's only fair that I include a link to the reminiscences of First Things writers about Neuhaus as well. This article is by no means the definitive portrait of Neuhaus, but it is a great picture nonetheless.

"At the time of his death in 2009, Richard John Neuhaus had been a public figure for nearly four decades. To admirers and friends, he was arguably the most influential American Christian intellectual since Reinhold Niebuhr or John Courtney Murray. The New York Times described him as a 'theologian who transformed himself from a liberal Lutheran leader of the civil rights and anti-war struggles in the 1960s to a Roman Catholic beacon of the neoconservative movement of today.' It was a conventional biographical arc — Neuhaus's life was defined by exchanging the ideals of liberalism for the dogmas of religious traditionalism."

"But that story is misleading, if not worse, since it distorts the convictions of a man wholly defined by his convictions. Neuhaus spent his life contending for the soul of the liberal tradition. Conversions great and small marked his career, and he often quoted Cardinal Newman, saying that 'to live is to change, and to be perfect is to have changed often.' But his commitment to political liberalism, far from being a youthful error he later repudiated, was one of his life's few consistent threads. The other was his orthodox Christian faith."

Spiritual Coffee: Make the Most of the Things of Earth - We All Need Church History - Knowing Yourself in Spite of Technology

Three tools for inspiration to energize your mind for the week. Here's some help for enjoying the things in the world without loving God less, for taking an interest in church history, and for reconnecting your soul to God's gift of grace and mercy in spite of the distractions of so much useful technology.

Prior collections are tagged under Spiritual Coffee.

The Strange Brightness of the Things of Earth, Joe Rigney (Cities Church)
Rigney has brought a common dilemma of faith into clear focus: does enjoying things in the world subtract from our love for God, or can it help increase it? Should we be cautious and self-conscious about enjoying things too much? Rigney's writing and teaching is some of the most insightful work I've ever read or heard on this subject. Sermon transcript or audio at the link. This is part of a series, so you can look at the related sermons as well. Rigney also has a five-hour seminar available in audio here at the bottom under Media ("The Whole Earth Is Full of His Glory") that I strongly recommend for going deeper.

"Turn your eyes upon Jesus/Look full in his wonderful face/And the things of earth will grow strangely dim/In the light of his glory and grace.

"What is the song telling us? It tells us that earthly things may have some brightness; they may have some beauty. They may bring us some joy. But when Jesus shows up, that brightness grows dim in his light. That beauty fades in comparison to his wonderful face. In his presence is fullness of joy, and therefore the delight we had in earthly things is now dullness and dust."

"That tension comes into focus when we take the dimness of earthly things in the light of Jesus and set it alongside the hymn we just sang, “This Is My Father’s World.”

"This is my Father’s World/He shines in all that’s fair/In the rustling grass I hear him pass/He speaks to me everywhere. 

"What does this hymn teach? Not that earthly things grow dim, but that God shines in them. “He shines in all that’s fair.” They’re not dim; they’re bright with his brightness. They don’t go silent when God shows up; He speaks through them. And there’s the tension: which hymn is true?" 

13 Reasons We Need Church History, Matthew J. Hall (TGC)
Excellent thoughts on why church history has special value and importance for Christians, and how to study it wisely. Although Hall doesn't state this directly, there's a lot of encouragement here for all Christians that we should care about knowing our history, and we shouldn't think of it as a matter only for seminary students and scholars. 

"Throughout Scripture, rightly remembering is critical to faithfulness. As early as Eden, Eve listens to the serpent, succumbing to faulty interpretations of the past and of God’s revelation in particular.

"Throughout the Old Testament, God calls his people to recall and retell his gracious saving acts. Yet Israel repeatedly forgets, fails, and strays. The New Testament is also clear: Historical events are at the heart of the good news.

"Our mission is to recount that history and call the nations to repent and believe in the Christ. Even the development of post-apostolic doctrine involved history. The early church fathers and councils had to determine, for example, what it meant to say with historical confidence that Jesus was both God and man."

Habits of Mind in an Age of Distraction, Alan Jacobs (Comment Magazine)
The summer issue of Comment Magazine is available online now (free and simple registration required). It's hard to choose among the articles - the focus on how design and technology influence us and our faith is tackled in a diversity of forms. For an introduction, James K.A. Smith examines cutting-edge technological marvels against the potential to forget who we are (or what makes us human) in Our Built World. I chose Jacobs, however, because distraction and divided attention are major challenges for most of us. Having used social media and tech prolifically and personally himself, as well as questioned and criticized it, Jacobs speaks from real life with the benefit of examining himself and all of us against Christian thinking across several centuries. But what he grabs hold of here and leads us through is not a list of ways to tame technology; instead, it's a vital question of what happens when our perception of life and self goes wrong. Those who see only their own failures and imperfections and those who see only a world of outward problems in need of the right technological fix both suffer from a distorted view of the Gospel and self. Here is good medicine.

"So what do we do with the great majority of people for whom excessive self-examination is the last problem they're likely to face? I think this is one of the most important problems Christians—and especially pastors—face today."

Spiritual Coffee: Safeguarding Church and Family Culture - Who Is David French? - Know Jonathan Edwards in 30 Minutes

Some evening fuel for thought, or a head start on your morning coffee time.
Prior roundups of current links for feeding the Christian mind under Spiritual Coffee.

Carl Trueman Adopts Rod Dreher's Benedict Option ("Eating Locusts Will Be (Benedict) Optional"),

Carl R. Trueman (First Things)
Rod Dreher has been known for the past two years for the idea of "the Benedict Option," which essentially argues that the Church at this cultural crossroads needs to focus on preserving Christian culture in our churches and families and communities rather than putting all our attention into trying to change the wider culture of the world. Dreher has observed that while we were trying to change the culture in society, we lost track of preserving the unique culture of the Church. Now we're in danger of losing that altogether in the next generations. I think Dreher is right, and the Church needs to hear this, so it's encouraging to see more theologians and scholars affirm this. The namesake for his idea comes from the Order of St. Benedict, and the fact that much of the learning and history and philosophy of the world was preserved through the Middle Ages by monks living in private Christian communities. Dreher doesn't advocate for monasticism itself, but he has some really good points about how we should learn from that concept and apply it to safeguarding Christian community and beliefs.

If you want to read more from Dreher on the Benedict Option, here and here are some good pieces to give you the overview. If you prefer video, then use this.
And if you really want to dig into all his historical and anecdotal examples, this is long but very thoroughly explained.

It's not the only thing the Church should focus on, but I think Dreher is spot on that we have failed to realize we aren't preserving a separate and unique culture and community in the Church. We've been so busy trying to shape the wider culture that we lost track of safeguarding and passing on a uniquely Christian culture in the Church, and largely failed to pass Christian faith and teaching in a coherent form on to the next generation. Moreover, we aren't on the offensive against culture now. We're on defense. We need to give great attention to preserving what is Christian in our lives and churches so it doesn't get pushed out by social pressure, because that's what is most likely to happen if we keep trying to wage a culture war the same way and don't re-examine what's happened to our churches.

Who Is David French? And Why Is He Running?, Denny Burk
This is worth reading not just because David French's third-party candidacy is intriguing, but much more because what Burk shares about French's past words and character is a tremendous demonstration of Christian character and faith put to the test under the harshest conditions. Bookmark this for raising your kids to be men and women who take courage in the Lord and honor Him with all their hearts.

Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God, Dane Ortlund (Equipping You in Grace - servantsofgrace.org)
Want to understand what makes Jonathan Edwards such an important Christian theologian, and how some of his remarkable ideas energize faith and the fruit of the spirit in Christian living? Dane Ortlund has got you covered in this podcast. Ortlund is the vice president of Bible publishing at Crossway, and author of several books including Edwards on the Christian Life.

Spiritual Coffee: Power of Christian Narrative in Fantasy - Against the Myth of Progress and Historical Pessimism - Glorifying God as a Generalist

I really enjoyed today's collection of links. I hope that you will as well. Taken together, these three pieces restore some of the excitement and wonder in exploring God's Creation and the endless possibilities of discovery in the Christian mind and imagination. There is even now a great portion of beauty and glory awaiting us.
(Click on Spiritual Coffee for earlier collections of links.)

James Stoddard's Interior Castle, David Randall (First Things)

The quoted section below is enough to excite interest, especially for those who enjoy C.S. Lewis's fiction or The Lord of the Rings. I usually get the most enduring and satisfying enjoyment out of stories that have a great layer of truth underneath them. When you piece together the fantastic and unusual elements of a story and find they reveal a mystery about reality, you gain something personal and permanent. It is always a delight to discover beauty, but to discover something that is both beautiful and true is priceless.

"James Stoddard ought to be famous for his Evenmere trilogy—The High House (1998), The False House (2000, revised 2015), and Evenmere (2015). He isn’t, unfortunately. The High House received the Compton Crook Award for best fantasy by a new novelist, but The False House and Evenmere haven’t gotten much notice. But the three books are wonderfully written fantasy, and Stoddard is nearly as good as C. S. Lewis at recapitulating aspects of the Christian myth. He isn’t just trying to be another Lewis, either. Stoddard’s trilogy does something new and nifty: It is an argument in fiction that narrative is at the center of Christian theology—that the universe is narrative, that Christ is its sacred narrator, and that narrative is the means by which mankind can understand God. Stoddard’s sustained invention and stylish prose are enough by themselves to earn him a place in the mainstream fantasy canon. But his shift of emphasis from Christian myth to Christian narrative makes his trilogy a major work of Christian fantasy."

[I also find this description of the worldview of the villains to be brilliant. The deception that mankind can achieve a perfect world lies behind virtually all modern false ideologies (and the next link from Al Mohler happens to show what it's like for those ideologies to crash down).]

"The books’ villains are the Society of Anarchists, who are ruthlessly dedicated to establishing a perfect world."

Christ’s Exaltation: The Ground of Our Hope, Albert Mohler (Ligonier)
A succinct picture of Christ's reign and how it provides us confidence both now and for the future, contrasted with the hopelessness of faith in "progress" or perfection of humanity and its disillusioned counterpart, historical pessimism.

"'The twentieth century, it is safe to say, has made us all into deep historical pessimists.' So observed Francis Fukuyama in his seminal 1992 book, The End of History and the Last Man. What happened? The nineteenth century’s humanistic faith in inevitable moral progress was destroyed on the battlefields of two cataclysmic world wars and in the unprecedented murderous cruelty of Hitler’s gas chambers, Stalin’s gulags, and Pol Pot’s Cambodian killing fields. History seemed to point, not to a golden age of moral progress and enlightenment, but toward an age of unspeakable cruelty backed by technological developments that would stagger the moral imagination.

"Fukuyama demonstrated the failure of historical 'faiths' such as Marxism, with its confidence in the ultimate victory of the proletariat through class struggle and revolution. His analysis of modern historical pessimism was correct, at least in this respect, for secular myths did not fare well in the twentieth century, and most contemporary Americans look to the future with a mixed sense of unease and uncertainty.

"The Christian worldview stands in stark contrast both to the humanistic idea of progress and to modern secular pessimism."

How to Glorify God by Being a Generalist, Joe Carter (TGC)

Probably fascinating for anyone who is curious how people like Justin Taylor, Russell Moore, Tim Challies, and departed heroes like Chuck Colson manage to have such diverse knowledge and insight into so many subjects. Carter is careful to say he can only describe his own experience, and that it may not be a calling that applies to many people. Particularly interesting are his conclusions that generalism is artistic, generalism is a personal act of worship to God, and generalism is not primarily pursued for the sake of imparting knowledge to others (although that is a valuable byproduct) but for the sake of beholding the majesty of God in greater and wider detail. The highest reward is a private moment of awe and wonder between the generalist and the Lord.

This line is also helpful and practical for those of us who get stalled out trying to find the perfect way to do things: "sometimes you have to use whatever method works for your personality, even if it’s less than ideal."

"What if we generalists are beckoned to seek knowledge not as a means for some other end but simply as an act of performance before our Creator? This is not to say that the knowledge gained cannot be used for practical purposes or in service of our neighbor. But viewing knowledge-seeking as a performative act done for God and before God frees us to treat it as a form of ongoing artistic worship. Just as David performed for God with leaping and dancing (2 Sam. 6:16) we are free to seek truth, knowledge, and understanding in a variety of areas as a way of glorifying him." [On Sincerity:] "'By validity I mean whether an artist is honest to himself and to his world-view,' Schaeffer says, 'or whether he makes his art only for money or for the sake of being accepted.' If it’s to glorify God as a work of art, generalism cannot be pursued as a means of impressing others with our erudition. For the Christian generalist, the pursuit of knowledge is a performance for God, not an act of pedantry to impress our peers. The validity comes in performing not for the applause of others but for the approval of our divine patron."

"What turns generalism into an art (or at least one major “style” of art) is “sublime pattern-matching,” seeing the interconnectedness of God’s creation in a way that impresses our minds with a sense of awe and veneration of his grandeur and power. 

"God takes delight not in the discovery of the patterns of his revelation (which, of course, he already knows) but with the way that the process leads us to childlike worship. It is the process that leads us to continuously repeat the prayer of the 17th-century astronomer Johannes Kepler: “O, Almighty God, I am thinking Thy thoughts after Thee!” It’s the pursuit of knowledge and discovery as a way to glorify our Redeemer by becoming increasingly enchanted by his majesty." “What is elementary, worldly wisdom?” Charles Munger asked. “Well, the first rule is that you can't really know anything if you just remember isolated facts and try and bang 'em back. If the facts don't hang together on a latticework of theory, you don't have them in a usable form.”

Great Explanation of "You Are What You Love"

This review by Derek Rishmawy of James K.A. Smith's book, which I strongly recommended yesterday, is outstanding. Rishmawy captured the main message of the book with a clever title: Reading This Book Will Not Change Your Life.

What he meant is just what Smith argues in the book: it is not learning and knowledge and beliefs that change your life; it is how those things change or affect what you love and care about. If you simply read a book and it doesn't help you correct or reshape what you love and desire, you will still continue to follow the same habits and the same affections you did before you read the book, with the same results.

This is certainly not a new idea, and if you're a frequent reader of sites like desiringGod.org you are familiar with this truism. What makes Smith's book compelling is that he is uncommonly insightful and helpful in identifying and revealing the unconscious patterns and habits that keep us in love with the wrong things, and demonstrating how to form habits and practices that build desire and love for God and the right things. You can see that from the first part of Rishmawy's review (but I really recommend the whole thing):

"My title’s kind of tongue-in-cheek, but it cuts to the heart of James K.A. Smith’s thesis in his new book You Are What You Love: The Spiritual Power of Habit. Over a number of works, especially his Cultural Liturgies series (Desiring the Kingdom, Imagining the Kingdom), Smith has argued that modern, Western Christians (especially Evangelicals) have been held captive by a false picture of the human person as “thinking thing.”

On this view, you are what you think and there’s something of a simple correlation between what you believe and the way you live. Discipleship, then, is mostly a matter of proper spiritual data input.

But we’re not just thinking things. No, following Augustine (and the Scriptures), Smith argues that we’re worshipers. We’re desirers. We’re lovers who are shaped by those things we love most.

The hitch is that our deepest loves aren’t necessarily those things we consciously think we want most, but those drives that reside within us at an almost unconscious level. And they show up in our habits, our basic patterns of life.

If that’s the case, then, discipleship is not mostly a matter of data input, or simply reading the right book, but about the long, arduous path of having your desires transformed through the power of habit. Yes, our loves show up in our habits, but it’s also the case that our habits and practices give testimony to and shape our loves.

And so, we are constantly being shaped in one way or another by the various practices (liturgies) we’re engaged in, whether it’s checking our smart phones, visiting the local mall, eating fast food, or consuming varieties of ideologically-loaded pop cultural artifacts.

For this reason, the transformation of desire isn’t simply going to happen by rearranging some of our beliefs, but by adopting the sorts of practices that shape our loves to conform to the Kingdom of God. These liturgies train our hearts, sort of like batting practice trains our arms or training wheels our stabilizer muscles, in the way they should go."

Click through for the rest of his review...

You Are More Defined by What You Love than What You Believe

That's the idea behind James K.A. Smith's book that has just been released, You Are What You Love. Smith explains the ideas behind the book in this interview with Justin Taylor, which gives you a good summary of what he means and why it's helpful.

I have looked forward to this book, more than any other, for many months. I wrote about this book in December before its release, and compared it with the approach of worldview training: What Drives You? Does Christianity Capture Your Head But Not Your Heart? Both are valuable. The very important insights in Smith's book are especially important because they point out what worldview training often overlooks or underestimates. In Smith's words: “The Augustinian point is that you are defined by what you love. It’s your loves that govern your action and pursuits. Indeed, you are more defined by what you love than what you think or know or believe.”

In other words, when faced with a dilemma between what you desire and what you believe, you are likely to follow what you desire. That's one reason that raising kids with the right Christian doctrine or consistent worldview teaching just isn't enough to keep them involved in church. If we don't shape their hearts and desires so that they love and delight in the worship of God, then their hearts will lead them elsewhere. It's not as if beliefs and doctrine are irrelevant; what you think does influence what you do. It's just that your beliefs must penetrate to your heart and be matched by what you enjoy and love. If they aren't, then what you enjoy and love will work against what you believe and often overrule it. Like a car that always pulls to the right on the road because it's out of alignment, as long as your heart is drawn away by loving something other than Christ, you will have to do a lot of extra work and show constant attention simply to keep the vehicle going straight. Imagine what a joy it would be if the wheels were in alignment and your heart went straight for Christ on its own.

So Smith's book is exciting and valuable because it helps replace the missing pieces in much of Christian teaching and worldview training. For those who have been struggling to make progress in directing their lives toward God, this book may be the thing that helps you lay aside every weight and run freely.

Smith makes another very important observation that every Christian should consider: whether we know it or not, there are habits and practices in our lives that are shaping our desires and defining what we love. We don't just come with the wrong desires built in - there is plenty of that, but we also build the wrong desires up and give them power by what we feed them. You can be working very hard to study the Bible and to develop a Christian worldview, and at the same time you may be surrounded by habits and social patterns that are making your desire for things other than God very strong. Spending a lot of time studying and learning about God isn't going to change you if at the same time your daily life is building and strengthening a love for something other than God. Like an alcoholic sitting in a bar surrounded by people drinking (my illustration, not Smith's), it really doesn't matter how much you believe your alcoholism is lethal or how much you believe it is wrong to drink. If you are immersed in an environment that is saturating you with the aroma and temptation of something you want very much, and you are choosing to keep inhabiting that environment, you are likely to give in. Beliefs and knowledge alone will not usually stop you unless you also love what you believe in more than you love what you are tempted by.

A lot of the value in Smith's work is his detection of these different practices and habits in our lives, and his explanation of how we can develop practices that will feed good desires and grow our love for God. You Are What You Love is a good manual for figuring out what is hindering your love for God and learning how to reshape that and stoke the fires of good desires for godly things. Shaping your heart, and the hearts of your children, is a crucial part of Christian discipleship. I hope this book will be a powerful encouragement and help to many people.

What You Make of God's Glory Is the Test of Whether You Really Worship Him

I've been reading through Tim Keller and Kathy Keller's devotional on the Psalms, The Songs of Jesus. This description of God's glory struck me:

"What is God's glory? It is his infinite weight, his supreme importance. To glorify God is to obey him unconditionally. To ever say, 'I'll obey if . . .' is to give something else more importance or glory than God." (The Songs of Jesus, p. 43).

The glory of God is our supreme value and treasure. It is what we recognize as representing God's infinite worth, His being deserving of our complete worship and devotion. If we make our worship or obedience to God conditional, meaning we will only give it if God meets our desire or expectation for something else, then we aren't really worshiping God or treasuring Him. We are using Him as a means to what we really want. Which means we value it more than God. That is how you know when you have made an idol or false god out of something: you want it so much that you aren't satisfied with God unless He also gives this other thing to you. Truly worshiping God above all means that you don't need anything else along with Him. He is your ultimate desire. He may give you other things to enjoy too, and He does, but they aren't nearly as important as Him. That is giving God His true glory.

The Kellers make another good observation about worship as well:

"But while glorifying God is never less than obedience, it is more. God's glory also means his inexpressible beauty and perfection. It does not glorify him, then, if we only ever obey God simply out of duty. We must give him not only our will but also our heart, as we adore and enjoy him, as we find him infinitely attractive. And there is no greater beauty than to see the Son of God laying aside his glory and dying for us (Philippians 2:5-11)." (The Songs of Jesus, p. 43).

Worship isn't just submitting to God and obeying Him because we have to. It is enjoying God. Even when you don't feel this (and it is often difficult for most of us - often there are other things we feel we want more than God), what you should pursue in worship and prayer is that very feeling. You can worship God even when you don't feel it if you pray for the right feelings of devotion and affection and ask God to make you desire what you should. Desire for God should be heartfelt and genuine, but it also honors Him to say you know you should desire Him - that He is worth that much - but you don't right now, and you need His help. Never hesitate to come to God in prayer just because you don't feel what you should. Asking Him to fix that honors Him too.