Rose, my pastor, made a comment on my online Bible Study called Decoding the Apocalypse in response to a question: What is a clear witness? Below was my response to her comment.

As with most things, the Enlightenment Project produced a rash of reductionism. Witness was reduced to things like the “Four Spiritual Laws” and “door-to-door” evangelism with the sole intent of putting an argument to people demonstrating that they were sinners and needed salvation so they could go to heaven when they died. If they surrendered they prayed the “sinners prayer” and got their barcode, so they could be successfully identified upon entry into eternity. Sound familiar?

Living openly, lovingly, and for others with Kingdom of God attributes such as the “fruit of the Spirit” was not prioritized as “witness.” If it was, it was more like “sissy” witness where “speech and argument” was seen as “real” witness. Of course, Paul introduced what he calls the “fruit of the Spirit” which is love, out of which come all kinds of lifestyle corrections. I believe for him, the “fruit” was a tangible demonstration of the “age to come” entering into “this present evil age.” It was the lifestyle of the future being brought into the lifestyle of the present. It was living the future now as though it was then. Living in this way surely would produce abundant conversations about why one is living differently than others in our physical communities. Telling one’s story in lifestyle would surely allow for opportunity to tell one’s story in words where one can give and honest, resounding, answer that she/he loves God. There is little or no argument that can be given for a life change. When the blind man in Scripture told his story, “I once was blind, but now I see,” having known the life of the blind man who was now a seeing man, who would argue.

Yes, to live well and to talk well we need to be empowered by the Spirit. His presence and power is not just for healing the sick and casting out demons. His presence and power are needed to help us live a Kingdom present life in the midst of an age gone amuck. When was the last time that when faced with a choice of a decision to be Kingdom people or “amuck people” we stopped and even briefly asked for the power of the Holy Spirit to decide in favor of being a Kingdom person? I better stop now, I’m “talkin’ too much here.

It’s been a week since Jerry Falwell went off into the next phase of life. Some thoughts have been roaming around about his life. I did and do not ascribe to his form of fundamentalist theology. Having said that, his life and ministry seem to me to try and bring together what is often a dualism of Church and State. As a pastor, he entered into the realm of politics where the church has been so silent while the American state has become secularized.

He has passed and followed a rather contemporary cultural practice of leaving his ministry to sons. As I understand it, one son will become pastor of the church in Lynchburg while the other will assume duties as the head of the university. This is just another incident in which father-son inheritance in ministry secession has occurred. I am sure there are many. Some come to mind: Oral to Richard Roberts, Robert Sr. to Robert Jr. Schuller, Billy to Franklyn Graham, John to Joel Osteen. I wonder why that is.

I also wonder why there are not more pastors involved in political situation at the local, state, and national level. The belief of the founding fathers that there should be no regulated church by the state has turned into a dualism of Church and State. There is now a deep ugly ditch between the Church and the State.

I’m not advocating that we return to a former state of being that caused our forefathers to seek church freedom. In England today, N. T. Wright, who is Bishop of Durham, is also a member of the British Parliament and actually attends session of the Parliament while remaining a pastor of his local church in Durham. I realize that is an English model.

What I wonder is: what if pastors of USAmerican churches became entered the realm of politics and remained pastors of their congregations at the same time. How would that change the ugly ditch between Church and State?

Well, Dr. Jerry Falwell has gone on to his life after death awaiting his life after life after death. I wonder what he thinks about where he is and if it is what he thought and taught it would be. I wonder if he could return what he would believe and teach differently. I wonder…

I’m in SoCal for a conference. While visiting my mother-in-law with my wife, I was listening to a DVD that was running kinda in the background. It was someone preaching and what he was saying hooked my attention for a moment. He was dealing with interpreting a “verse” by defining the words. He had come across a verse that began with the word “gather” but after reading it he said God spoke to him and told him that the word there wasn’t “gather” but “assemble.” So he was off to discover how that could be. He told his listeners that he checked out Strong’s concordance and on other word study tool only to find that the original word in the passage could be translated by “gather” or “assemble.” But, as he exclaimed to his congregation, “I heard God say it means “assemble.” He searched and searched to discover what God had told him. Then he found Webster’s Dictionary 1828 where he found that gather meant one thing while assemble meant something and because Webster’s Dictionary 1828, according to him, had been created based on the Bible, meaning on the KJV, he had found a way to confirm what he had heard God say.

It is this form of exegesis, or in my opinion, non-exegesis, that causes such anemic followers of Jesus. Think about it. The original language did not inform his conclusion, but an English Dictionary based on and English translation, which was translated in 1611. I used to tell folks “bad theology makes a cruel taskmaster.” Later, to be clearer I changed the saying to “bad theology makes you stupid,” or “bad interpretation makes you stupid.” I know that is “in your face,” language and surely not “politically correct, but there it is.

What always amazes me, it looks like I would get over this after a while, is that the folks listening to the speaker interpreting Scripture from an ancient English Dictionary were all cheering at his ability to confirm what God had told him. Suggesting that God has said something that he has not said doesn’t seem to bother these teachers. Keeping people ignorant of what God has said often gives them “authority to rule.” The picture that comes to mind when I hear this kind of stuff is God sticking his finger down his throat. I surely wouldn’t want to be in God’s faced when this event happens. I’m sure that I may have caused the same “picture” on some things I have said. Well there are just a few thoughts from a moment of watching a DVD and having a renewal moment to help folks get out of the “stupid” moments that comes with reading and interpreting Scripture.