Monthly Archives: May 2006

It’s Just Between Me and God

Tommy WalkerLast night, ten of us from Anchor attended a Tommy Walker concert at Blackhawk Baptist, one of the megachurches in Fort Wayne. The place was packed. We occupied the right side of two pews in the steep balcony. It was not a young crowd, so I wouldn’t put it in the post-modern fold. It looked to me like most people attending were in their 30s and 40s. Which described Anchor’s delegation.

I’m not sure “concert” describes it right, at least not in the way I think of concerts. This was a participative event, like a two-hour worship service without the preaching–just the congregational singing part. Only a couple of songs were sung “to” us. Nearly all of them included projected lyrics so we could sing along.

Tommy Walker leads worship at a church in Los Angeles, and is also a “hired gun” worship leader for Promise Keepers and other organizations. Worship leaders are sort of the new Christian rock stars. Yes, we still have Third Day and the Newsboys and MercyMe and lots of other “traditional” concert performers. But worship leaders/writers like Chris Tomlin, Matt Reddman, and Darlene Zschech now fill stadiums just as easily.

I’d never heard Tommy Walker before. I liked him, liked the concert, consider him genuine. He did a wonderful job leading in worship. I recommend him.

With that extended disclaimer, I’m going to comment on aspects of the event.

The music was nearly all of the vertical variety–me singing to God. This seems typical of contemporary worship music. Most of the worship songs written today can be summed up with these generic themes: God is awesome, he’s wonderful, he’s my strength, I love him, I need him, God is great, I praise him, I honor him…. You get the picture. Most of the songs we sing now are basically love songs to God. Now, how can you criticize sentiments like that?

But last night, there was nothing about the body of Christ, about being a mighty army, about going forth and changing Fort Wayne, about telling our friends and neighbors about Jesus. No, it was all personal singing, between me and God. Nobody else around me was needed. It was a collection of individuals who could zone off in worship, just them and God and Tommy’s superb lyrics.

I’ve noticed this trend for years, and others on the Anchor worship team are, by now, tired of hearing me gripe about it. I guess my formative years included a lot of “horizontal” songs which spoke about the church and evangelism–“One in the Spirit,” “Pass it On,” “I’ll Tell the World,” “Get All Excited.” I miss hearing the body of Christ express those themes in song.

It seems outlandish for me to criticize vertical worship, and please admonish me if I’m out of place or just plain ignorant. But I left the concert last night feeling that hundreds of individuals (myself included) had experienced a good time of individual worship, and that’s as far as it would go.

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Capture the Flag Blues

Ron CookRon Cook is pastor of the Salem United Brethren Church outside of Chambersburg, Pa. That’s where we held the Day of Missions last Saturday. Ron has pastored UB churches in Pennsylvania since the 1960s. My first memory of him comes from Rhodes Grove church camp. We spent many weeks there one summer when Dad directed the food service. Ron Cook was a new minister. I remember Dad saying to my Mom, “That Ron Cook is a really good young guy.” Or something like that. Hey, it was 40 years ago. But the gist was that Dad liked Ron, for whatever reason. And, therefore, I liked him. And always have. Imagine if Dad had given me a different first impression by saying, “That Ron Cook–I can’t believe the screwball thing he did today.” My young mind would have formed a different lasting impression. But thankfully, my view of Ron molded around the “good guy” label.

Even after what he did to me.

At Intermediate Camp (that’s what they called it back then‚Äîthe next camp after Junior Camp), we played Capture the Flag. Ron Cook was a counselor, I was an impending 7th grader. They divided the camp in half, with a chalk strip going between a row of cabins and bisecting the tabernacle. All of us hung a colored strip from our pants, a different color for each team. The goal, of course, was to grab the other team’s flag and get it across the chalk line into your own territory.

Most guys formed raiding parties of three or four and played chicken with the other team, trading feints. I went solo, wandering inconspicuously into enemy territory, starting from the hilltop where the guys’ cabins were and meandering along the fence to where two guys guarded the enemy flag. The guards didn’t pay me much attention, instead watching the action elsewhere.

I got fairly close, and then made a running lunge for the flag. I grabbed it and sprinted toward the chalk line, probably 50 yards away. Those incompetent guards screeched and pointed frantically at me. And scores of kids began chasing after me.

I aimed for the middle area between the guys’ cabins and the middle row of cabins. Teammates stood on the other side of the chalk line, cheering me on. I was no more than a couple yards from the line when, from my left, Ron Cook zoomed from between two cabins, plucked my flag, and skidded to a stop about ten yards further down.

I was so close to being a hero. I’ve always kicked myself for not throwing the flag over the boundary line. I could have done that. But instead, they recaptured the flag and took me prisoner.

I’ve often resented Ron Cook for denying me my moment of earthly glory. But my resentment always fades because, after all, as Dad told me, Ron Cook is a good guy.

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Strange Bedfellows

So online pornographers and the Family Research Council are now on the same side. Sometimes you just have to shake your head in wonderment.

The proposal was to create a new .xxx web extension. Pornographers opposed the idea, because they felt it would make it easy to confine their sites to a seedy area of the web which could be easily blocked off. Internet providers could then block or filter all sites with that extension. It would make it easier to control objectionable websites.

But the Family Research Council argued that creating such a domain extension would “legitimize” the adult entertainment industry. News flash: this industry already exists, and is legitimite. Not respectable, but legitimate. It’s nice that the FRC favored this win-win situation.

A drug is being developed which could prevent a certain cancer in women which kills 5000 women a year. However, Christian groups have opposed it, because it would seemingly “legitimize” non-marital sex (which increases the risk of this cancer). So this life-saving drug faces a battle from right-wing Christians.

The same groups are apprehensive about potential vaccines for HIV/AIDS, because they contend it would only encourage sexual relations. Am I, as a Christian, supposed to oppose an HIV vaccine?

I remember in the 1980s, when religious groups blocked a bill which would have outlawed or restricted certain types of abortion. They argued that since the bill didn’t prevent all abortions, then it was insufficient. So if there are four million abortions in a year (I don’t know the real number), maybe it would have cut the number in half. But these right-wingers felt that it was all four million…or nothing. And so, it was nothing. Pragmatists said, “Let’s save the two million now, and work on the other two million later.” But that would seem like a compromise to the hard-liners. And so, the abortionists and anti-abortionists basically both argued against the bill. Strange.

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American Injustice: Chris Says Goodbye

I don’t get it. Who is voting for Elliott Yamin? I don’t know anybody who favors him (as if I’m authoritatively plugged in to the American zeitgeist). I figured it would come down to Chris and Taylor Hicks. Now I’m quite certain that Taylor will win. Just as I was certain Mandisa and Kellie would still be around.

daughtryCraig Berman has a good article about last night’s Idol on the MSNBC site. He writes, “Will this year’s champion be Taylor Hicks, who owes much of his success to a manic stage presence that may not translate to the audio-only CD? Will it be McPhee, who copes so well under pressure that she’s had two mediocre weeks in a row? Or will it be feisty underdog Elliott Yamin, who lacks anything resembling star quality?” He gives the nod to Taylor. As do I.

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Macs, Intel, Viruses, and Feeling Included

On Tuesday night, as I rested between ping pong matches (yes, it’s necessary to rest), Gary told me he was having a hard day. Gary, who does computer trouble-shooting for the school system, said he got a new PC at home and taught his wife how to use it. The problem, he explained with a grimace, is that she’s far from computer savvy. He came home to find the new computer in some kind of infinite rebooting loop, which required all of his computer prowess to fix. Fixing his wife’s non-computer savvy would prove more difficult.

I then told Gary that I couldn’t relate, because I’m a Mac user, to which he said, “My condolences.” I told him that we primitives don’t know anything about infinite rebooting loops; the very concept is absent from our universe. Typical interaction between PC and Mac users.

Apple has begun using Intel chips in Macs. I told Gary that we Mac users have always felt left out, because we don’t get the viruses which the PC world takes for granted. At social gatherings, PC guys discuss pitched battles with invasive viruses and having their DSL connections hijacked, and exhilarating stuff like that which can inspire pack grunting. Meanwhile, we Mac users stand idly by, bearing nothing to contribute to the conversation. We twiddle our thumbs, feeling excluded. It’s not a good feeling. How we have desperately yearned to experience the worms and viruses which everyone else experiences in such resplendently diverse glory.

Now, with Intel chips in our computers, we Mac users can actually boot our Macs using Windows XP, which is, of course, an unimaginable dream come true. And in the process, we could potentially become privy to the viruses which the rest of the world has come to enjoy and appreciate, not to mention the crashed networks, missing drivers, and so much more which colors that side of the fence with multi-hued greenery. The very thought of the adventures to come makes me salivate all over my keyboard. Excuse me while I locate a towel.

Of course, it won’t work that way. We may bring the viruses to our computers, but they won’t do anything sinister. They’ll be impotent. And so, we remain non-combatants, relegated to the rear-guard of the infection wars. But at least this gave me a talking point with Gary. I don’t feel as excluded as I did before.

By the way, I love the new “Get a Mac” ad series from Apple. There are six ads. I’ve only seen one on TV, but all can be viewed onscreen with Quicktime or downloaded. I especially like the one on viruses.

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Elliott – It’s Your Time

It is, of course, Elliott’s time to go bye-bye. All four finalists did well last night, in my view. But Elliott–well, the water’s too deep for him. Katherine has stepped up the showmanship angle, which Taylor and Chris already had. Elliott’s been left behind. He’s not got the makings of a pop star. I’m a bit surprised he made it this far, frankly.

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Christians vs. Christianists

This afternoon I turned to the back page of this week’s Time magazine, to the essay by Andrew Sullivan. He hooked me with his first line: “Are you a Christian who doesn’t feel represented by the religious right?” Yes, I am. Most vociferously, I am.

Sullivan wrote, “The term ‘people of faith’ has been co-opted almost entirely in our discourse by those who see Christianity as compatible with only one political party, the Republicans, and believe that their religious doctrines should determine public policy for everyone….So Christ is a conservative Republican?”

Then I loved this line: “‘My Kingdom is not of this world,’ Jesus insisted. What part of that do we not understand?”

Sullivan then suggested that we coin a new word: Christianism. While Christianity is a religious faith, he proposed Christianism as an ideology, echoing the distinction between Muslim and Islamist. “Muslims are those who follow Islam. Islamists are those who want to wield Islam as a political force.” He described Christianism as “the view that religious faith is so important that it must also have a precise political agenda.”

I like that. So Tom Delay and Jerry Falwell are Christianists. My own Congressman, I believe, is “merely” a Christian, which is good.

Sullivan said, “I dissent from the political pollution of sincere, personal faith. I dissent most strongly from the attempt to argue that one party represents God and that the other doesn’t. I dissent from having my faith co-opted and wielded by people whose politics I do not share and whose intolerance I abhor. The word Christian belongs to no polical party. It’s time the quiet majority of believers took it back.”

The thing is, Christianists aren’t nearly as visible as they were in the 1980s, during the Moral Majority heydey (which also thrust James Dobson and others, quite willingly, into the political limelight). But the Christianists were na√Øve (and therefore perhaps considerably more pure) back then, novices to politics. They merely wished to stem the cultural slide, not turn us into a theocracy (well, not all of them did, anyway). But today, the Christianists are highly experienced, meticulously organized, thoroughly plugged in to the power centers. They know the strings to pull, the buttons to push to get their all-knowing way. They have become fully intertwined in the political power scene. And I’m sure Jesus is just tickled pink about it.

Now here’s the part of Sullivan’s piece I disagreed with. He said that some Christians believe God is unknowable to our limited minds, and that religious faith is often “interwoven with doubt.” He said many Christians believe we can’t know God’s view on such things as Terry Schiavo, contraception, the role of women, or “the love of a gay couple.” These are the words of someone whose religion doesn’t include a whole lot of Bible study, because the Bible does give us considerable direction regarding social issues. Not always, and not always in line with Republican dogma (like, uh, the poor? ever hear of them, noble Republican?), but Christianity for many of us doesn’t require an undue amount of uncertainty.

So I disagreed with Sullivan that we don’t know how God feels about a lot of things. But most everything else settled well with me. It made for good reading.

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Richard Prabhakar – One of Our Giants


The May 6 Day of Missions concluded with a memorial service for Dr. Richard Prabhakar, who died last fall after a lengthy battle with heart problems. Richard was an extraordinary man, though it’s difficult to mention him alone. You really need to say “Richard and Miriam,” because they were so much of a team. I wondered what the memorial recognition would be like. Turns out it basically consisted of two videos–Stephen Prabhakar telling about his father’s life, and then a video from the funeral in India. The latter lasted probably 10 minutes, and it was captivating.

I’m well aware of the high respect Richard receives in the States. But this video showed the respect he commands in his homeland. During the memorial service, we hear Josh Prabhakar talk about his father, and it’s very moving. Then we see the crowd walking, presumably, from the memorial service to the cemetery. This is what got me. The camera basically stayed in one place and filmed the people as they walked by. They just kept coming…and coming…and coming. The common, ordinary people of Narsapur and beyond, honoring the faithfulest of servants.

My eyes watered up at this point. I didn’t think the stream of people would ever end. It was amazing. Pam and I went out to eat afterwards, and she mentioned the same scene.

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Burt Lange – the Day He Drove the Combine

Burt Lange.jpg

Burt Lange (right) with new UB missionaries Jamie Fiedler (left) and Anna Geivett (center).

This past weekend, the Day of Missions that Pam and I attended was held in Chambersburg, Pa., which is the most densely UB-populated place on earth. Six UB churches have Chambersburg addresses, nearby Greencastle has four churches, Shippensburg has three, and I’m sure gobs of surrounding towns yield additional UB churches. People talk about Huntington, Ind., as being the UB “Mecca.” Well, my vote goes to Chambersburg.

The event was held at the Salem UB church, which I’d never before visited. It’s a stately brick building; “stately brick” seems to be a common architectural motif of UB churches in that area.

I spent a lot of time in Chambersburg when I was a kid. We lived in Harrisburg for 3.5 years ,which corresponds to my grades 4-7. The conference campground, Rhodes Grove, is located just outside of Chambersburg. Dad directed junior camp for two summers, and he ran the food service for one entire summer (which means we stayed on the grounds most of the time).

On Saturday, Burt Lange and former missionary Aldean Saufley played an outstanding prelude–Burt on the piano, Aldean on the organ. Burt is an incredible, incredible pianist. He hooked up with Tony Fontaine during the 1960s when Tony did annual revival services at my church (Devonshire UB in Harrisburg), and Tony began using Burt in other meetings. They even performed together in the White House. Every summer at camp, Burt entertained the crowd with his piano-comedy bit. He’d have us all in stitches. Burt still possesses that amazing sense of humor.

But I remember Burt Lange for another reason, as well. He was the evangelist for junior camp in 1967. Under his preaching, I went forward and dedicated my life to Christ. I walked to the altar with my head bowed and knelt at the altar across from a counselor whose face I didn’t see. After a few seconds, I heard the counselor weeping, which seemed strange. I looked up…and it was my Dad, a last-minute counselor that year. Dad’s first words were, “Steve, do you know what you’re doing?” I said I did, or at least thought so. Dad talked to me, and I responded, though I can’t remember a bit of that. But in the end, he led me in a prayer of salvation. So that was pretty special.

A couple years ago, I ran into Burt Lange at an event in Chambersburg and mentioned this to him. He said, “I can’t take much credit for that. With your background, somebody would have got you.” And he’s right. I grew up in a strong Christian home, and it was only a matter of time. Burt just happened to be working the harvest fields that particular day. It could have been somebody else, but it was him. But that doesn’t diminish the place Burt has in my heart.

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Radio Surfing – Another Guy Thing

Pam and I returned from Pennsylvania today, arriving home with still some daylight left so that Jordi and Molly could get some time out in the grass. They love that.

I’ve become a huge, huge fan of XM Satellite radio, especially for long trips. No more must I find new channels every time I come upon a different major city. No more do I experience the frustration of locating a channel I really like, only to have it gradually fade, becoming increasingly static-ridden and eventually indecipherable. Rather, I can listen to the same channel for 500 miles if I want.

But of course, I don’t do that any more than I would watch the same channel on TV all day long. Heavens no. Instead, I find myself constantly switching channels. Maybe I’m on ESPN. When an ad comes I change to Fox or CNN, or maybe to the 70s music station. If the next song isn’t to my liking, I bump the channel up a notch to the 80s, then the 90s. Who in the world designed this car radio with only six presets?

I radio-surf constantly, which is probably a tad more hazardous than talking on the cell phone while driving. I imagine it annoys Pam to pieces, though she’s always so engrossed in a novel that she may not even notice. Huh. Of course she notices. She’s probably chuckling inside at this overt display of Guy Attention Deficit Disorder. Call it GADD. I’ve got it big-time.

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