Changes in Evangelicalism

Here is a recent symposium hosted at Wheaton.  The panel was composed of three members from Wheaton’s class of 1968: Mark Noll, Nathan Hatch, and John Piper.  (There must have been something in the water that year.)  They discuss what they see as the most important changes in evangelicalism since the 1960s.  It’s interesting to hear them try to come to terms with whether the developments in evangelicalism of the last forty years have been primarily positive or negative.

The Pastorate and PhD Studies

Sean Michael Lucas, a professor of Church History at Covenant Theological Seminary, wrote a very insightful and helpful post on his blog entitled Ministerial Students, Calling, and PhD Studies. I never even remotely considered PhD studies before I went to seminary, but, for some of the reasons he mentions and for other reasons that he doesn’t, I have begun to think that PhD studies might be a very strong possibility.

I still feel a primary calling to the pastorate, but I think that getting a PhD would make me a better pastor (an issue that he mentions), and I would also like to keep the option of heavy teaching responsibilities open. For those of you in seminary or headed for it, I would highly recommend reading this, even if you don’t imagine ever desiring to get a degree beyond the MDiv. Your time in seminary might change your mind; that’s what happened to me!

Come Out, and Be Separate

One of the ongoing struggles of evangelicals is to rid themselves of fundamentalist notions of “being separate” from the world. In the past, especially in the wake of public, humiliating losses in the public square on the issue of creationism (e.g., the Scopes Monkey Trial), fundamentalists essentially retreated from any engagement with the rest of the world and called other believers to “Come Out, and Be Separate.”

On the other hand, sometimes Christians are now so concerned to avoid the appearance of fundamentalism that they go too far to the other extreme, living in a way that is virtually indistinguishable from the world. This is a difficult line to walk.

In preparing for my New Testament Theology final, I was reading Frank Thielman’s (Dr. Thielman is a Presbyterian Professor of Divinity at Beeson Divinity School) chapter on 1 Peter in his Theology of the New Testament, where he writes, “Peter reminds his readers that as God’s specially chosen people, they are ‘holy’–separated from the societies in which they live by their manner of life” (576, my emphasis).

I had never thought of the issue in quite that way–the error of fundamentalists is that they insist on separation in geographic terms, trying simply to stay away from the rest of the world. Certainly, we should completely separate from the rest of the world, but not by staying away from them; rather, we should separate in the way that we live. Our lives should be utterly holy–completely set apart for God’s purposes alone–which means that we should be totally distinct from the world even as we interact with them.

Very interesting.

Want to Hear Something that Will Make You Mad?

Do you remember that whole gunman on the campus of Samford University this morning? Apparently the security officer who reported that he was confronted by a black man with a gun (keep in mind that this is Birmingham, AL) had, in fact, made the whole thing up. Yep, it was just a hoax.

Unbelievable.

Samford Security Scare

Samford University (the University in which my Beeson Divinity School is a graduate school) went into lock-down mode this morning. I got an e-mail at 5:47 this morning saying, “SU-EMERGENY - A suspicious person with a weapon is on campus. Remain in your dorm until ALL CLEAR. THIS IS NOT A TEST,” and I was just able to catch my roommate who was on his way to work out at the gym.

They have just lifted the lock-down, and here is the best news report that I could find so far.

UPDATE 9:32am: Our University President, Dr. Andrew Westmoreland, just posted this update.

(Somewhat) Recently Viewed Movies

1. There Will Be Blood - An excellent movie that reminded me of The Godfather, which says quite a bit considering that that’s my favorite movie. Daniel Day-Lewis (as everyone has by now seen or heard) delivers a brilliant performance, maintaining just a touch of humanity in Daniel Plainview until his final disintegration in the end. The last scene, although disturbingly violent, is full of enough biblical allusion to keeping one thinking for a while.

2. On the Waterfront - Elia Kazan’s 1954 classic about organized crime and the exploitation of longshoremen in New York. A very good movie, although I liked the other two movies listed here better. Marlon Brando was the standout performance, although the sermon that Karl Malden delivered as Father Barry was also very stirring.

3. Das Leben der Anderen (The Lives of Others) - Definitely the best German film I’ve seen, although I’ve never watched Das Boot. It follows a Stasi captain in 1980’s East Germany on his surveillance assignment of a popular writer. I found it particularly timely having just completed a course on twentieth-century totalitarianism, and a great depiction of the state intrusions into private life under the “really existing socialism” of the GDR. The last twenty minutes were particularly moving and a beautiful example of redemption and sacrificial love. It was flawlessly acted and shot throughout. It did contain several scenes that needed fast-forwarding, but that’s the beauty of rentals. Books and Culture had a good review of it recently, but unfortunately you have to be a subscriber to read more than the first part online.

Preaching and Preachers

Is it a good thing that most churches have generally only one man preaching? Obviously, there are some churches that only have one pastor trained to preach, and most churches that generally only utilize one man have other preachers once every 4-6 weeks (on average). Still, when does preaching turn from being the faithful proclamation of the Word of God (that is, Word-centered) into a personality cult to hear what Pastor So-and-so will say this week (that is, man-centered)?

I’m not saying that churches who generally utilize only one man to preach do so out of a desire to perpetuate a personality cult, but do they consider this issue when they decide who is to preach? Are multi-campus churches (where the same preacher is live at one campus but displayed on screens at the other campuses) good? Specifically, does that model teach us to value the Word of God itself, or does that model teach us to value the preacher?

Getting a little closer to home (because I have to evaluate my own motives for being a preacher when I ask this question), do I want to be the one preaching the majority of time because I think that I have the most important things to say, or because I feel a burden to do so? Is it an issue of control, or an issue of faithfulness?

This is a challenging question, especially because I feel that I desire to hear certain preachers more often because (1) God has given them special gifts to preach, which we should not down-play; and (2) a big criterion for evaluating preachers is their faithfulness in the exposition of the Bible. So, do I love listening to John Piper because God uses him mightily to proclaim his (God’s) Word, or do I love listening to John Piper because I like John Piper?

Please don’t read this as though I am targeting specific pastors at specific churches that I have attended; most of the pastors under whose preaching I have sat are some of the most godly, humble men I have ever met. This post arises much more from questioning the motives of my own heart.

I do have some more thoughts on this, but I would be interested in your thoughts on this subject.

Reading

In celebration of finishing classes for the semester, I decided to pick up some lighter, summer fare, something I’ve wanted to read for a long time. No, not Danielle Steele; Mortimer Adler’s How to Read a Book. (BTW, what an unfortunate cover on that edition.  Since when does the image of a man with flowing blond hair, puffy sleeves and lipstick flipping through a magazine-like object signal intelligent reading?)  It’s a classic book about reading for understanding, and I should have read it long ago. So far, it’s excellent, and I think it will be great preparation for beginning the reading list for my comprehensive exams over the summer. Here is some of what I’ve taken away so far.

Adler divides reading into four levels. They build upon each other, and the lower levels are incorporated into the higher levels of reading.

1. Elementary: the most basic level, simply recognizing the words on the page.

2. Inspectional: examining a book’s structure and contents to get an idea what it’s about, and reading it through quickly to gain whatever you can at the surface level - hopefully coming away with the author’s main point and main arguments.

3. Analytical: Slower, thorough, complete reading; gaining as much as possible from the book.

4. Syntopical: Reading a wide range over books on the same subject to understand the subject. The type of reading we do for research.

So far, I’ve found the section on inspectional reading most helpful. As a history graduate student, I’m sometimes expected to read four or five books a week, not to mention research and historiography papers where I need to wade through 50-100 books. It’s simply not realistic for me to try to read every word of these books and understand every point they make. Instead, I’m often trying to get the main idea and flow of the author’s argument, in order to be able to relate it to other historiography. Inspectional reading has been (and can become even more) useful for me. Adler divides inspectional reading into two parts: skimming and superficial reading.

Part I: Skimming - This is a quick process where you give yourself a set amount of time to look through a book. You simply examine a book to discover what kind of book it is, it’s structure, it’s main point, and decide whether it’s worth reading in greater depth. Adler gives six steps for this process:

1. Examine the title page, preface.

2. Study the table of contents to understand the book’s structure.

3. Look over the index to get a feel for what kinds of topics are covered in the book.

4. Read the publisher’s blurb on the back or inside cover.

After completing these steps, you should be able to decide whether it’s worth skimming more systematically. If not, put it away and be done with it. If it is, continue on.

5. Look at the chapters that seem most crucial to the argument. Read the intros and conclusions of these chapters.

6. Page through the book, occasionally reading a paragraph or two (but never reading more than a couple pages at a time), always pay attention to the author’s main contention. Be sure to read the conclusion to the book (usually the last two or three pages of the book) where the author often summarizes his main points.

This process should take anywhere from a few minutes to no more than an hour. Upon completion, you should be able to say what the book’s about, the author’s main point, and be able to categorize it mentally with other books you’ve read. You also should know whether the book deserves more of your time in closer reading (either now or sometime in the future).

Part II: Superficial reading - This is the next step after you’ve skimmed a book and decided it’s worth reading more closely. Here you read the book straight through very quickly without stopping to ponder things you don’t understand. Essentially, you’re just trying to take in everything that you can from the surface of the book. Pay attention to what you can understand, ignore whatever you can’t. This quick read-through will give you a good sense of the book and how it holds together as a whole, even if you miss much of the detail. It also prepares you to comprehend the book much better if you do decide to read it more closely, at the analytical level.

Adler ends the section on inspectional reading with some good advice regarding reading speeds. “Many books are hardly worth skimming; some should be read quickly; and a few should be read at a rate, usually quite slow, that allows for complete comprehension. It is wasteful to read a book slowly that deserves only a fast reading.” Ideally you want to vary your reading speed according to the importance of the content you’re reading. “Every book should be read no more slowly than it deserves, and no more quickly than you can read it with satisfaction and comprehension.”

Over the past two semesters, I’ve been forced to adjust to the reading load of graduate school. I can no longer read every word like I did as an undergrad. (At least, those times when I felt like doing so.)  I’m a relatively slow reader - usually no more than 30 pages/hour for comprehension - so Adler’s advice on inspectional reading is particularly relevant if I want to have any sort of life outside of reading for school. Over the last year I think I’ve learned how to read superficially, scanning a book for the important parts and reading those more closely, but I still have much room for improvement in this sort of systematic skimming and superficial reading.

One thing I’m not sure about: I still think it might take me too long to read a book straight through superficially. I wonder if, after doing the skim, my time wouldn’t be better served by jumping straight to the parts that look most important and reading those more closely, perhaps at the analytical level.

Ransomed from every language

And they sang a new song, saying,

     Worthy are you to take the scroll
          and to open its seals,
       for you were slain, and by your blood
               you ransomed people for God
          from every tribe and language and
               people and nation,
       and you have made them a kingdom
               and priests to our God,
       and they shall reign on the earth.

–Revelation 5:9-10

Clearly, the focus here is the sheer diversity of peoples who will be represented around the throne of God, together worshiping the Lamb. I have always imagined this in a way where the peoples around the throne would look different, but I also wonder how they might sound different.

If, as most linguists and sociologists believe, language plays such an extraordinary role in who we are, how we think, and what we do and do not say, is there suggestion in this text that we will not end up learning some universal, heavenly language with which to address each other, but that we will all instead gain the capacity to understand all other peoples as they speak from their own languages?

So, rather than speaking Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, Latin, or even King James English around the throne, will I communicate using 21st century Midwestern, American English, but nevertheless listen to (and understand!) people speaking Coptic, Sumerian, Celtic, Chinese, Swahili, and every other possible variation of every other language?

It struck me as an interesting thought–how better to give the Lamb glory than demonstrating his power to save people from all the different people groups and languages ever to have been spoken!

How to Calculate the Best College Football Team Ever

This was a really interesting statistical method of evaluating teams across history, and I think that it should settle the question once and for all: the 1995 Nebraska Cornhuskers were the best college football team ever to play the game.

But I’m still a little offended at the absolute lack of professionalism and class displayed by Kirk Herbstreit in this.