Birkdale Baptist Church

Life, Heart and Hope in Jesus

This podcast is from a talk that I gave at the So Sexy it Hurts Event held at Mayfield Baptist Church in Newcastle a couple of weeks ago. Sorry, but the final couple of minutes are missing. In this talk I discuss how the way in which we view ourselves has radicaly changed, the origins of the myspace shot, how everything is now porn, why everyone is a personal PR firm, why ’sexy’ has become the 21st century adjective of choice and why the image of God is so important to life today. (Those with a keen ear for regional Australian accents will note how with my Melbourne accent I mispronounce Newcastle, thus offending the locals throughout my talk.)

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Funny Video Via Julie Glavic which poses the question, what if Starbucks was run like the Church?. Don’t what this means in light of Starbuck’s withdrawl from Australia?

      

John McCain found himself painted into somewhat of a strategic corner during his failed run for the Whitehouse. Due to the record unpopularity of the Bush administration he could not ally himself too closely with his own party. Therefore he portrayed himself as a Maverick who had bucked up against his own party on numerous occasions. However this created a dilemma, that is a line of logic that goes like this,

A) I hear you and understand that you have a negative opinion of the Republican party B) I am a Maverick not at all like your typical Republican, often I have opposed my own party  C) Therefore this election make sure you vote Republican

Yes it is overly simplistic and no metaphor bears too close an examination, and this post is not at all a political comment, but I am sure you get my point. By positioning himself against his own party, he was almost convincing people not to vote for himself.

Let’s look at another similar example. In their book The Fall of Advertising and the Rise of PR Al and Laura Ries, point out that a companies need to be extremely careful in trying to communicate to the public that they are rectifying past wrong doings. For example would you book a flight on with an airline who’s slogan was,

“Sayers’ Airlines: We no longer crash!”

Even though Sayers Airlines may now have a perfect flying record, just their admission that they once crashed places a seed of doubt in your minds. Even this slogan would probably put you off.

“Sayers’ Airlines: Unlike the others we don’t crash!”

Why? Because when you are advertising air travel, even if you have a perfect record of never crashing, you should never utter the ‘c’ word.

The church finds itself in a very similar position to John McCain, we know that the wider culture does not view the church in a favourable light. Therefore all kinds of churches from new pentecostal, to emerging, to missional, to mega all position themselves as ‘maverick’ compared to what has gone before, we say to unchurched people “come to our church because we are not like typical church”. But when we adopt this point, we find ourselves in a tricky place, we position ourselves against other forms of church, and promote an alternative form of church. This position is tricky because it assumes that the unchurched person will have enough of a sophisticated understanding as to be able to differentiate between differing church styles. We are faced with a dilemma of understanding that we need renewal but also of encouraging others who look on what we are doing with skepticism to join us.

So how do we get out of this conundrum? Well I am not going to even begin to pretend that I have all the answers. But I do believe there is a clue in the story of Pentecost. Up till that point in the story, Israel had been called to operate as something of a lighthouse, that their holiness would shine out to the surrounding nations and that people would be drawn in. Often we see the New Testament as a reversal of this trend, that the people of God are called to ‘Go outward” (To be really technical we are talking about Centrifugal and Centripetal forces).

However the force that is created by Pentecost is more akin to an explosion that goes indiscriminately in every direction. Not only does the Holy Spirit push the church outward, it also renewed and refreshed a depleted band of believers. The Church is moved from being a small collection of followers to a vital and global movement. Thus it is not a new management theory, a new theology, or a new communication tool that manages to both renew and ’send out’ the people of God, but rather it is a fresh outpouring of the Holy Spirit.

      

Gen Ys should learn the language of older generations, writes Anne Fawcett. Read whole article here

      

Man in Nebraska sues God. Read full article here

      

Text Conversation between me and my brother who is in Cambodia this week.

My Brother “Hey. How is this for Hyperreality? I am in Angkor Wat, talking to a Buddhist Monk who just showed me a video history of Cambodia on his I-Phone.”

Me ” How is this for reality? I just rocked up to  church and in the door way was toilet paper and a full specimen bottle of urine. I don’t want to touch it.”

      

“Clearly, an idol has stood up, bringing with it fear, even terror. We have put our trust in the financial markets to save our real economies. But now the idol is staggering, as idols usually do, and we can make out more clearly its profound betrayal.”

Bob Goudzwaard

The Dutch Christian politician Bob Goudzwaard’s book Capitalism and Progress  is a classic read for anyone interested in the intersection between faith and culture.  For an interesting analysis on the links between idolatry and our current economic crisis check out Bob’s article A Note about the Credit Crunch, Climate Change and Environmental Responsibility

      

Like most people around the world I spent yesterday following the results of the US elections. I have followed the campaign closely since the early part of the primaries. However I was on a plane when it was announced that Obama had won so missed the crucial moment. But watched with others as we collected our baggage at the carousel.

Later on as I watched Obama’s acceptance speech I was struck by the religious nature of American politics. I don’t mean the influence of Evangelicals or the religious right; but rather as a non - American observer I cannot help but be struck by the implicit religiosity of American culture. The sermon like speeches, the fervour of the crowds, the Messianic view of leadership, the faith in the divine calling of their nation, the reverence for the flag and anthem; all combine to create an environment that seems to the outside viewer as something akin to a religious rally. In Australia, my home, such rallies would never be seen. Sure, during elections we have rallies, but only those who are inside the political machine would turn up. You would never see thousands turning up to support a candidate, we here in Australia are simply too cynical about the political process. I would vouch that it is the same in most other Western English speaking democracies.

This difference in politics reveals to us a key cultural difference between America and other Western Countries that those engaged in mission must understand. That is that the US is at its core is a deeply religious country. This is one reason why Church attendance is so much higher in the United States when compared to Canada, France, Germany, Britain, New Zealand and Australia. But there is a deeper religiosity that pervades American culture that seems to even be evident in the actions and attitudes of those who would not describe themselves as people of faith.There seems to be in so many American souls a latent sense of hope and faith, a belief that their country is called to be something special. Americans posses a sense of optimism and enthusiasm, that is not seen in other Western Cultures.

Much of this can be traced back to America’s beginnings. America at it’s inception was influenced by two streams. One of these streams was the influence of the Christians fleeing religious persecution, who saw the United States as  place to in freedom get to the business of creating the Kingdom of God on earth. The Second influence came through the founder fathers who were deeply influenced by the European enlightenment, and saw a chance to break away from despotic rule and create a republic of Enlightenment with Deistic sensibilities. Thus America represents both these influences, and the sense of hope in the future that undergirds these philosophies creates a different religious environment in the United States to that in other Western democracies. Even through many American Christians would point to the way in which post-modernity and secularism seems to have begun dismantled much of the framework of the church, there is definitely much more of a structure left tstanding than what we find in other Western countries.

So why is this important for those engaged in Mission? Well what this is all means is quite simple really. Often missional practices and methods that work in the United States will not work in other Western countries. The secularism that those of us outside of the United States face, may posses some of the similar traits to the beast that we must battle, but in many ways it is a different animal.Therefore we have much to learn from what happens in America but we must always remember that context is key to mission, and not all practices will be transferable.

      

We find ourselves as the church in the developed world in a strange position. I have heard others say and have said myself often that the church has returned to the place that it found itself in the book of Acts. We are in a missional situation. With the influence of Christendom fading, we find ourselves confronted with a pluralistic missionfield. We are forced to reconfigure ourselves to reach this new reality.

However there are many ways in which our situation is different to the book of Acts. The church in Acts was energised. It was filled with Jewish beleivers, who were motivated and excited by their discovery of the Messiah. Gentile believers were turning to faith as the Roman world began to collapse. Thus the gospel was moved forward on a fresh wave of excitement. We face a different situation, whilst our missional situation is something akin to the book of Acts. When it comes to the reality within the church we find our situation something more like the book of Hosea. In the time of Hosea, the people of God found themselves compromised by their worship of both God and the gods and Idols of the surrounding nations. So it is the same with us today. When we look inside the church we find the people of God struggling to live holy lives as they encounter a whole gamut of new idols, that is new gods who go by modern names, materialism, consumerism, technology, image and security. Although these gods seem new, the corrosive effect that they have on faith is the same as the ancient idols of Baal and Moloch.

So to position ourselves as the church, we must confront both realities, if we are to be missionaly effective we must also take note of our cultural captivity.

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“THE Facebook generation always got what it wanted. A place at university, laptop, iPod or, for that matter, a job.

Here is a generation that does not remember the time without mobile phones or computers. Raised by doting parents who told them they were special, they played in competitions where there were no losers and everyone got a trophy. It is a generation who have never experienced economic hardship in their working lives and are too young to remember the last recession of 1991, but they will see hardship now.

“Generation Y are about to enter a world that looks very different from the one they faced six months ago,” says Dominic Thurbon, managing director of the Centre for Skills Development. “We’ll see the heat come out of the employment market and gen Y will find their ability to debt-finance their lifestyle will get tougher.”

From the Age Newspaper. Read full article here

      

A while ago I wrote this post Leadership as Avenue to Stardom about how increasingly children’s toys are about being a star on stage. Now Christians are in on the act check out Guitar Praise. (Notice the Hyperreal Slogans Live the Dream - Play with Rockstars ) To quote Marge Simpson ‘Hhhhmmm’.

(Thanks to Rohan for the heads up)

      

When i wrote this article What can we learn from the Mike Guglielmucci scandal? I had no idea of just how many people would read the post. I was watching the stats rise by the second as thousands of people checked it out, obviously reeling from the whole sorry episode. As I spoke to people in the days after the event and checked out what others were writing on the net. I noticed that a lot of people who were understandably angry and disillusioned. However there were also a huge amount of young people, who’s response went something like this.

“Hey we all sin”

“Can’t wait to see him back and speaking and leading again”

“All sins are equal”

“He is gonna come back bigger and better from this”

I noticed that how people were responding to this very much illuminated a trend that I see all across the church as I interact with young adults. That is a confusion over the idea of sin and consequences. Let me explain.

Christianity in contrast to many other religions believes in the concept of grace. That is the radical idea that no one is beyond the love of God. That you can be a mafia hitman and if you commit your life to Christ your sins will be forgiven. This is the Christian idea of salvation. But I am noticing that this idea is getting a slightly bit skewed. Many have failed to realise that whilst grace allows us to be free from sin, grace does not give us a free pass from consequences.

I remember having dinner with Gerard Kelly when he was out here in Melbourne. He used the idea of playstation to illustrate how many young people today grow up without an idea of consequences. He said that when you grow up with playstation, you grow up with the idea of the reset button. If you mess things up or if your character dies, all you have to do is press reset and you can start again from the beggining. This is true also of the education system that many young people have grown up with today, which encourages the building of self esteem over the old pass/fail model, students are protected from the consequences in a way that they have never been before. The age of peerants has also seen many helicopter parents swoop in and save their kids from the consequences of their actions. Thus it is no wonder that many struggle to understand that whilst grace covers a multitude of sins, it does not press the reset button on the consequences of our choices.

Thus whilst all sins are forgivable in the eyes of God, not all consequences are equal when it comes to our earthly lives. Staring at the girl crossing at the lights in the mini-skirt may be a sin but it does not carry the same consequences as killing a pedestrian because you were drink driving. God will forgive you for both sins if you bring them to him, but the consequences of the drink driving offence will probably mean that the rest of your life here on earth will be a living nightmare as it will be for the family and loved ones of the person that you killed. It is possible to be forgiven and right with God yet to have trashed your life here on earth. This is one of the paradoxes of having free will.

Here we can learn much from scripture. Abraham was given a promise by God that out of him would come a nation that would inhabit the land that God would give them. In essence the Hebrews had been given a gift of grace. They had been picked by God to be his ambassadors, his chosen ones. However they still had to be shaped, moulded and had to learn the consequences of their actions. Isidore Epstein writes of the early Hebrews in Judaism: a Historical Presentation

…their slave mind still possessed them. Largely undisciplined and spiritually enervated…Much less could they rise to the loftiness of their mission for the fulfilment of which the land was promised to them as an inheritance.

When I read this quote I can’t but help think that we have much in common with the early Hebrews. We who are believers may be saved; yet to be truly disciples, to live the kingdom life on earth, we must understand that much of biblical teaching is written to shape our life and show us the way out of poor choices and their disastrous consequences. When we just have the concept of grace minus an understanding of consequences, we create a generation of immature spiritual consumers. This is a key concept to understand for young adults and those leading them.

      

Do you remember the episode of Seinfeld where Elaine goes to the bizzaro world diner and becomes friends with the bizarro world Jerry, Kramer and George. Well Ladies and Gentlemen I just found the bizarro world version of my book, this blog, and a lot of what I teach.

To summarize. This guy (an advertising exec) is encouraging young advertising execs to not feel guilty about selling people stuff because they are engaged in a noble cause. The more people buy the less spiritual they will become and thus the world will become a better place. No I am not making this up. Sounds like this guy has been reading Richard Dawkins on the subway. Hows this for a quote?

Our civilization — while a long way from perfect — is safer, fairer, healthier and more prosperous than any other in history in good part because we have subordinated the search for spiritual purity in favor of material well-being…Material well-being seems to be the only antidote to the vicious, violent, cold-blooded history of the “great human spirit”, so often praised by misguided poets and pandering politicians…Ad men and women: stop apologizing for promoting materialism. People planning a trip to the mall are far less likely to do mischief than people planning a trip to heaven.”

Enter bizarro world here (cheers to Kevin Thow for the link )

      

Some of you who have heard me speak about my book the Trouble with Paris will know that the book came out of me asking the question “What is a theology of Paris Hilton?”. I realised that Paris Hilton captured so much public attention because she was a cultural symbol, an icon of our age. But what was she was symbolizing? The answer is a number of things. But I want to focus on one of them. Paris Hilton is a symbol of the almost religious power of luxury in our culture.

Ever since civilization began, symbols of affluence and power have been sought by humans to make powerful statements about ourselves. But the last ten years of our history has seen luxury and luxury items elevated to a level never seen before in human history. This effect has been seen across the globe in democracies, capitalist economies, communist regimes, and Islamic Republics. What we have seen in the ten years of economic boom is if you like the democratization of of luxury. I am not saying that everyone has access to luxury goods but that rather the world, the rich, the middle class and the poor, have been exposed to the luxury bug and thus there has been a flattening of the desire for luxury goods.

I think of the missionary I spoke to who works and lives in a slum in South East Asia who tells me about the desire for luxury goods (albeit bootlegged) amongst his neighbours, I think of the African Pastor that I spoke to recently after one of my talks, who was asking me how can he protect his congregation from the corrupting desires of materialism, I think of the prayer letter I read this morning by a missionary secretly working in a communist state, who asked that supporters pray for the young people of the country that he is serving in who are growing up with no moral framework because their parents are too busy working to earn money for consumer goodies.

So what is behind this global desire for Luxury? I was recently listening to a forum on the BBC world service and one of the contributors noted that Luxury today operates as a kind of religion. Luxury items are items or services that have been overlayed with deep sociological, cultural and even mythological meanings. For example a signed copy of Highway 61 Revisited by Bob Dylan will carry far more symbolic meaning that a signed copy of an album by the Huey Lewis and the News cover band that play Tuesday nights at your local sports bar. Why? Because our culture has deemed that Bob Dylan carries a tremendous amount of cultural currency. Therefore an album by him particularly with his signature, carries far more mythic symbolism. Thus you could say that a luxury item is a totemic symbol. It carries an almost magic quality. By adding a symbol such as the Louis Vuitton logo to a product all of a sudden its status changes. Fashion designers operate as modern day priests or alchemists turning ordinary objects into totemic luxury items.

There are some similarities between the cult of luxury and the mystery cults that existed in the Roman Empire during the time of the early church. The mystery cults were exclusive communities that required a knowledge of the secret rituals and beliefs to join. Naturally they became exclusive and sought after groups to join, they not only gave inititates access to a world of esoteric beliefs, they also created a social differentiation between believers and the rest of society. Thus the purchaser of luxury goods, hopes to join an elite group, they hope to prove their social power. The knowledge of what luxury goods to buy, becomes a kind of secret knowledge, that will differentiate to buyer from the rest of his or her peers.  By possessing a luxury item we hope that it will act as a charm, that it will inform others of our standing in the world, and thus our passage through life will be hopefully be smooth and successful. We wish through purchasing and owning luxury items the same thing as the builders of the Tower of Babel wished for, we wish to make a name for ourselves without having to rely on God.

But now many are in a sense of panic; the economic gods of the luxury pantheon seem angry and depressed. They mystery cult of luxury has taken a hit. The luxury items that many have used as signifiers in our culture of symbols, may now be out of reach for many as we lurch towards global recession. Hopefully, many who have been caught up in the cult of luxury will now begin to ask the deeper questions and begin to look beyond the material.

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In this episode, I meander along discussing spiritual expereinces amongst the unchurched, why we often feel dislocated in our lives, connecting with God’s pathos, evangelism as explaining the human condition, our inner longings, and just how far you can see from my office. Download or listen here

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So, to wrap up this way-too-long-for-Web-attention-spans essay, here is the good news in our very real and sobering predicament: Easy is not going to be easy any longer. Our culture’s addiction to ease is unsustainable. A core Christian conviction—one that informed much of the best of Western civilization—is that the good life is not easy. It requires discipline. It invites us into pain. It makes of us ascetics—not people who shun all earthly joys, but people who choose to limit our appetite for ease so that we might actually know true joy.

From a great article by Andy Crouch on the current economic crisis check it out in full here

      

A recent survey has found that one in four Gen Y are experiencing mental health issues. Read Article Here

      

I remember a few years ago watching a James Bond flick and thinking to myself that if 007 was a real life person that he would be a lonely guy. That despite living the male fantasy life of adventure, gadgets, fast cars and beautiful women, that Bond would surely at times find his life lacking the deeper, ongoing relationships that all humans crave. However it would be hard to test such a theory because Bond does not exist. However there is another semi mythical character who lives the ‘male fantasy life’ who does exist, the creator of Playboy magazine Hugh Hefner.

By creating Playboy magazine, Hugh Hefner not only mainstreamed pornography, but managed to change how millions thought about sex and relationships. Like all great pop culture icons, Hefner seemed to live the dream, embodying the fantasy of a new unattached male, who lived a life of unfettered hedonism and radical individualism.

Many social commentators now speak of the man drought, that is the lack of men who are willing to commit to long term relationships, who instead prefer casual sex with women, who prefer pornography to commitment and who look to their male friends for companionship instead of looking for a spouse. This kind of life was pioneered by Hefner. Strangely Playboy now makes more money selling accessories to young women than it does selling magazines to men, Playboy has also deeply influenced how young women see themselves. Just look around at the amount of girls that you see with playboy stickers on their cars. Ariel Levy in her book Female Chauvanist Pigs illustrates the way that Playboy has influenced what she calls raunch culture amongst young women. Playboy seems to embody on so many levels the hyperreality that has come to dominate Western Culture over the last half century.

However the tale of Hefner’s life seems to have a twist in its last act. The man who lives surrounded by naked models at the playboy mansion, who has spent most of his life partying with the rich and famous, who until recently has been in an open relationship with his three playboy bunny girlfriends, who has made millions of dollars, seem to be craving intimacy and relationship as he approaches his final days on this mortal coil. The irony is that Hefner seems to be living his last days as a broken and lonely man. In the last few weeks, two of Hefner’s girfriends have left him for younger more attractive men.

It is interesting that instead of being a life that men envy, Hefner’s life could end up turning into a cautionary tale. A reminder that the hyperreal dream cannot not deliver us what we desperately need as humans. That nothing that our culture can offer us can help us to deal with the fact that we age, and that we die. Check out the full story here 

For those interested in checking out how in contrast to the hyperreal view, the biblical imagination creates a more liberating and ultimately satisfying view of sexuality check out this article that has been one of the most popular posts on my blog The Unadulterated Pleasure of Limits

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Contemporary culture has changed how we view time. This in turn affects our expectations from life. In this episode I discuss how MTV changed how we all view time, the symbolism behind Lot’s Wife turning to salt, and how to create a small media circus at your local mall. Listen if you have time.  Listen or Download here
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Debt-stressed Gen Y is the ‘new poor’.

That is if you consider not being able to go on overseas holidays, spend big at the maill, and buy cars you cannot afford being poor. Still interesting article anyway check it out here