I hate preaching

Preaching. I don't think anyone really wants to be preached at. Most of the people sitting in pews every week don't want to be preached at. I don't know what makes us think someone wants me to ring there doorbell and preach at them. I can't stand preaching most of the time. Where did it come from, anyway?

I'll tell you where it came from. The Greeks. Those Greeks loved their orators. They were celebrities in their own time. In fact the best orators could convince you of something you didn't believe, and they didn't believe themselves. Greeks would have loved used car salesmen. Remember they invented democracy, I don't know if they were trying to be more fair or if they just loved all the filibustering.

The question is, does the Greek tradition of speaking homilies belong in Church any more than say showing a film? Is it biblical? I can't find any references to preaching in the bible that isn't also tied to teaching. Think of it. Sitting on a hard bench, eyes forward, listening to a lecture. It's more like school than anything else. So why do we think of it as part of "worship?"

My answer is to be creative. If you think you already know the information being preached walk out. Hang out in the lobby and talk to other people who are bored. That way you get in some fellowship. You can't have fellowship when only one person is speaking. The word paster means sheppard. Bringing someone to Christ isn't accomplished by dragging them to church where one guy is authorized to speak for God. That actually takes you out of the equation when you are the one that attracts them to Christ.

Now that I think of it people don't grow through the modern system either. Sure their is a lecture, but compare that to how much you'd grow if you had to lead someone to Christ and mentor them from born again till ashes to ashes. Relationships mature people. They get messy, and uncomfortable but you grow up. A really good paster is probably counter productive to spiritual growth. People come once a week to get fed and they think they are doing their part. What if they had to go looking for what God wanted to give them next?

Just some food for thought.

Repost: Faith in Action

"Thus says the LORD to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have held, to subdue nations before him; and I will (1) loose the armor of kings,(2) to open before him the two-leaved gates; and the gates shall not be shut; (Isaiah 45:1-2)

God promises Cyrus that He will open the gates of an otherwise impenetrable city for him. Most people would not know how to take a promise like that. They want to spiritualize it away. They want to delay it ‘til the future, preferably the after life. But Cyrus lived in the here and now and believed he was born for precisely that purpose... to subdue nations, not metaphorically, but in practical reality.

This brings me to the second point I wanted to make in the previous blog on this topic... Don't tell me what you believe... Show me! Or more to the point; don't try to impress God with your ability to quote His word back to Him. He's not impressed. He expects us to meditate on His word. What He is impressed with is faith. (Heb 11:6) Faith talks, but it also walks. If your faith doesn't have legs, if it doesn't take action in sync with your words, it's dead.

So here's my challenge to you: Meditate in God's Word. Press in. Let His Spirit impress upon your heart anything He chooses. Then act as if it applied to the here and now. One time in a parking lot of a state park, I was praying before work. A homeless mother and two children who lived in their car pulled in so she could sleep and the kids could play. I was concerned and approached the woman in her car, but she was already asleep in the back seat of her trashed out car.

The Lord let me see she was suicidal, but I didn't know what to do. I walked away and prayed. The Lord took me to Matthew 6:13 in the Lord's Prayer where it says, "Deliver us from evil". I knew God wanted to deliver this woman from the evil oppression she was under, but I wanted to just pray for her from across the parking lot and go back to work. When I asked the Lord if He wanted me to deliver her from evil, (to be the vessel He used to deliver her), He asked me if I saw anyone else in the parking lot?!?!

I knew He wanted me to act NOW on the Word. I did and within the hour she was born again, healed of an affliction and her friend who arrived on the scene also got born again on the spot! Moral of the story... Don't put off ‘til tomorrow what God intends for today!

Michael Q. Pink

I'm Not Here-You Can't See Me

Incredible. What a self-indictment. “Nothing dangerous is happening here.” Those men have already been taken out because they’ve swallowed the Enemy’s first line of attack: “I’m not here—this is all just you.” You can’t fight a battle you don’t think exists. This is right out of The Screwtape Letters, where Lewis has the old devil instruct his apprentice in this very matter:

My dear Wormwood, I wonder you should ask me whether it is essential to keep the patient in ignorance of your own existence. That question, at least for the present phase of the struggle, has been answered for us by the High Command. Our policy, for the moment, is to conceal ourselves.

As for those who want to be dangerous (cutting-edge), take a close look at 1 Peter 5:8–9: “Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings.”

What is the Holy Spirit, through Peter, assuming about your life? That you are under spiritual attack. This is not a passage about nonbelievers; he’s talking about “your brethren.” Peter takes it for granted that every believer is under some sort of unseen assault. And what does he insist you do? Resist the devil. Fight back, take a stand.

(Wild At Heart , 159, 160)

Sharing Faith

I woke today at 550am, thinking about sharing faith. It occurs to me that most groups that are militant about evangelism are actually trying to convert people to a "Christian" way of thinking, or worse "their" way of thinking.

The former is sharing a religion, the later is trying to win denominational converts, neither one is sharing the gospel.

Its tough when you think that this is all about how bad you were and how good you've become. I'm not a fan of that. For one thing, the only time it helps to tell someone how bad you were is if they feel beyond redemption. Most people are miserable, but unaware that redemption would help at all. So after we convince them that God forgives them no matter how bad they are we often follow it up with a description of God as a disapproving judge. Besides, we are all still human, and therefor, we continue to sin. If we use this method of evangelism we need to pretend like there's nothing wrong with our lives now that Christ is in it. We end up as posers and no one wants to listen to a poser.


We have been guilty of putting the great commission ahead of the first commandment. We have defined the great commission as "go and make disciples in every nation." The great commission is our Co-mission with Christ. Christ's mission statement is found in Luke 4:18, 19, when he quoted Isaiah,
18"The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he has anointed me
to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to release the oppressed,
19to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor."

The key here is love. If you can't love God, yourself, and your neighbor, don't share the Gospel with him. You only end up abusing him. Truth without love is always abusive. If we share our faith without love its just another MLM (multilevel marketing) scheme--an exciting presentation followed by a haste decision.

Our testimonial should be, "here is who God is for me right now." Nothing is more important, when spreading the gospel then what we think about God. If you worship a God who is distant and angry that's what you'll share with people. If you are madly in love with a God whose been over our sin since before He made us, then you might have something to share.

Here's a cool repost from our friends at afterlife.tv:

If you don't know them, they are committed to a vision of doing church differently. I'll try to dig up some of their awesome material on religion bytes. Totally inline with the philosophy of this blog.

Keep Going - Don't Stop!

Hebrews 12:1-2
Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.


In the Greek Olympic games of old, a unique race was run. The winner was not the runner who finished first --- it was the runner who finished with his torch still lit!

There are times in our lives when we feel like we just can't continue in the race. These are precisely the times when the enemy loves to assault us to the point of breaking and torment us saying "You'll never make it to the finish line, you may as well just quit now". This is the time we need to cling on to God's promises! The Lord will soon reward our diligence for all our toiling here in this world. Paul said, "Let us not grow weary in well doing for in due season we shall reap if we do not faint".

Let's allow God's wonderful promises to strengthen and comfort us in each circumstance so that we can run the race --- not to finish first, but to run together, side by side --- the flame of our torch reaching the finish line blazing brightly with fire for Him!

Reflection Question's by Pastor Joe:

1. Have you grown weary?
2. Do you need to allow God's promises to strengthen and comfort you today?

Sample Prayer / Commitment:

"Dear God thank you for showing me that its not what place I finish that matters but that I finish...strengthen and comfort me today and help me to keep pressing on toward the finish line. In Jesus name, amen."

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post #4: Some Rambling about Church

I created this site for a certain type of person—those who can’t stand the way we do church. Frankly I have more in common with those people than I do with the Christians I grew up around. I don’t want to dwell too long on that here but churches are full of sinful human beings that are searching for something. I’ve found something and quickly stopped attending. It’s not that I don’t think we need fellowship; it’s just that I think church is a terrible environment to get it.

When I found God again it wasn’t in a church but at a men’s retreat at a youth camp. I know people who first met God in a park, a base ball stadium, a car, a parking lot, at work, in a tent, an opera house, and a bar, but I have never met a person who met God in church. Well, in truth Mike Miller met God in church when he was young, but it was a revelation seminar. He was in the middle of pummeling a kid, and apparently smacked him so hard the kid invited him to church. Mike was so shocked he said yes. A week later his whole family got baptized. But I think that might be a rare instance.

I feel a little bad for some Christians who can’t imagine Christianity outside the confines of Church. I know I’ve made one cry once by talking about my ideas on the topic. God has not abandoned institutional Christianity though it doesn’t look like anything he’d have designed. Churches themselves are an amazing study into God’s willingness to meet us half-way. I hear people talk about the perfect will of God verses the permissive will of God and it seems a bit optimistic. This is a fallen world and it’s a bit difficult to believe that Gods perfect will is ever accomplished here.

It seems to me more likely that God respects our choices and works for good despite how little we understand Him. Perhaps the best thing Christians could do with their time right now is get to know God. Without that we have no context for all the other trappings of religion. We end up worshipping the regulations instead of God. We become frustrated when we bounce of the glass ceiling of our own misconceptions about God.

In closing let me say this, I don’t want to be negative in this blog but most of us would be so much more effective at reaching people if we just told people who God is for us right now. Graham Cooke is famous for saying God is the kindest person he’s ever met. Not a day goes by that God doesn’t do something kind for Graham. Now that’s a relevant thing to tell someone. That’s powerful, applicable, and timeless. It beats the socks off of, “Jesus is going to come and send anyone who isn’t perfect to hell.”

Sorry for the random rants, I’ll make it more positive next time.

Post #3: Poetry, Beauty, and the Gospel

Now that I’ve posted #2 something has become clear to me. I’ve been working to synthesize my beliefs into something that can be easily stated in the hopes that it will have an impact on people who aren’t reached by standard Christianity. The reality I’m confronted with is that the more I pear away the less impact it has. Faith, spirituality and truth are intangible and must be gleaned from the midst of things like poetry, song, and sunsets. The truth isn’t out there, it’s written plainly in the subtext between the lines. It’s in the marginalia.

Have you ever seen a movie and thought it was stupid or boring and then later watched it again and really liked it? There is a veil that covers our eyes and we think we know what’s going on but we don’t. 2 Corinthians 3: 7-18 explains it brilliantly but that’s of little use if you don’t believe in the bible.

I know, I named this site Mere Faith so I might want to try to explain Christianity in its pure form. Especially considering all the frustration I express about the rules, regulations, and doctrines, which have clouded faith behind religion. But it’s truly confounding. How do I explain beauty to a blind person? If I study for years to explain to you exactly what H2O is you will know it in your mind, but it means nothing until you are dieing of thirst. Which are you when you seek God—the scientist or the man dieing of thirst?

Here’s the thing. You can make a religion out of anything. Music, politics, sports, you name it. What we don’t often consider is that the bulk of Christianity is a man-made religion. True spirituality is rare among Christians; we are too busy worshipping regulations. Rules and regulations are easy to explain and often comforting compared to the chaos of a godless universe.

So the task set before me is difficult. This site is dedicated to the intangible. You don’t need religion, that’s just the search for God, what you need is to meet God. You don’t need theology, that’s the study of God; it’s easier to ask God about Himself directly. The bible assures us that God is everywhere, all the time*. Just talk to Him.

If you want to know more about this topic check out the book, “Where’s God?” by Bill Jastram. Available through:
Tualatin Foursquare Church at 503-603-0303,
PO Box 1027
Tualatin, OR 97062
Tualatin4square@comcast.net

Texts referenced * Psalm 139: 7-10