Have a drink, or don't

OK – I promised to crack the books and start some replies to Pastor Peter Lumpkin who is blogging toward (if, allegedly, not against) those in the SBC who find Resolution 5 offensive and anti-biblical.

This is where I'd start with Pastor Lumpkin, which would be the intro from one of his latest missives:

Thus far in our series on wine, we've really only made one important point contrary to our Brothers who insist that moderate consumption of alcoholic wine for pleasurable purposes is the only Biblically defensible position available; namely, that there exists a viable, scholarly understanding based on Scripture that calls for total abstention from intoxicating beverages--wine, in particular--for pleasurable purposes.

The reason I'd like to start there is because Pastor Lumpkin sort of just starts talking past people with this assertion.

Apparently – and I welcome his supporters, and anyone on his side of this exchange, to offer me a correction on this – he has misconstrued his own position for the position of those who object to Res 5.

See: Res 5 makes this plain statement in English --

the messengers to the Southern Baptist Convention meeting in Greensboro, North Carolina, June 13-14, 2006, express our total opposition to the manufacturing, advertising, distributing, and consuming of alcoholic beverages; ...
... we commend organizations and ministries that treat alcohol-related problems from a biblical perspective and promote abstinence and encourage local churches to begin and/or support such biblically-based ministries.

It makes alcohol consumption an all-or-nothing proposition, and as I pointed out back in '06, this is based on the conflation of the use of alcohol with the abuse of alcohol.

My position – and the position of every single person I know who would reject this resolution and advocate for "moderation" – is that total rejection of alcohol use is excessive and outside the Biblical mandate, but that to abstain personally is appropriate in a very wide variety of circumstances.

Let me give you some personal examples. I work at a place where, from time to time, the guys I work with at my pay grade go out and have a beer and wings. BTW, we have it at a place which is about two miles from the largest SBC church in NW Arkansas, and that church is not campaigning to have that establishment, or any of the dozen liquor stores in its 10-mile radius, closed. And their pastor is a supporter of Res 5. End Parathetical.

But we go out and we have a couple of beers, some laughs, some wings, and we go home. And when I say "we", I actually mean "they": I am the first-string DD. When we go, I drive, and when I drive, I drink Cokes. In that situation, it is both prudent and a ministry to stay sober because somebody has to drive home, and I take their marriages and families seriously enough to say, "I'll pass on the Sam Adams, boys, because I love you and I want us to get home safely."

If I was in my house, I might have half a beer – because I like a half a beer once in a while, but I also can't have more than half a beer because of my Lipitor. But I refrain when it is prudent and not because there is some phony holiness stipulation which convicts me.

Everyone with me so far?

There is also the matter of ministry service. I'm the facilitator for Adult community life at our church, and as such I am considered a member of the ministry team. We live in a dry county. In that environment – where the moral view of the gentiles is that alcohol is the deemin likker – there is no profit for a servant of the church to partake in a practice which is viewed by the locals as somehow satanic.

So again: I choose personally to abstain.

The question, then, is not is abstinence a valid choice? The question is when is abstinence a valid choice? And as a correlation to that question, when is moderate drinking a valid choice?

Therefore, as we begin to engage Pastor Lumpkin's points, let's remember that it is not the advocates of moderation who are demanding an either/or solution to the issue. The prohibitionist view is founded on the principle that either alcohol is evil or it is wholly and always good – and it is that view which is frankly untenable.

We'll get to the 19th-century perspective of prohibition and alcohol which Pastor Lumpkin borrows from a Presbyterians minister the next time we come across this topic.

Then again, a story like this comes up. Can't wait to see the spin on this one.

two things to talk about

[1] How should I feel about having a higher technorati score than Donald Miller

[2] Podcast. I am starting to get serious about doing one, and I want to do 30 minutes once a week. However, I think podcasting my sunday school class is frankly redundant and not really about the blog -- not the same brand, not the same flavor. If the non-negotiable of the podcast is a book review every week (with an author interview when possible/available), what other 10-minute segment would you like to see in a weekly podcast?

We should be so lucky or blessed

Let's hope and pray that God will bless the memory of us with this kind of fondness in the next generation.

Brilliant or Twisted?

Game Developer refuses $11 million in royalties.

Brilliant or Twisted? Vote in the meta.

iMonk podcast 87

This is, honest to pete, the last post I'm going to make on this topic from last week's imbroglio about the Piper video, and it's about iMonk's podcast this weekend. I have a HUGE stack of stuff on the next wave of baptist prohibitionist propaganda, and I'd rather do that as it is the season.

The first bit is this: I appreciate Michael's spirit and message in that podcast. No question. The "simul justus" thing is exactly what I was arguing two weeks ago when the fundies were trying to say something false about regeneration, and I appreciate that iMonk got e-mails that were, frankly, misunderstanding what I had written and he was willing to make clarifications.

The second bit is this: iMonk is right that the church culture in which the "know that you know that you know" "invitation" is the so-called "revival" message is broken. I am 100% confident that Dr. Piper wiuld agree with that.

Here's the place where, I think, iMonk and I part company -- and we have to, or else all kinds of people are going to get raptured and the world will be thrown into end-times chaos: assurance drives us to something other than mere solace.

Now, before I say another word, it is possible that this end part of the conversation is a function of people just talking past each other, and I'd be willing to see where we are disconnecting here.

In his podcast, iMonk makes a connection to Lutheran theology to say that we gain assurance through the sacraments and the preaching of the Gospel. Fair enough: stipulating the differences between Lutheran and Baptist sacramentology, I'd agree with him as far as that goes. But what does that assurance mean? Does it only mean that we are, as the olde hymn says, standing on the promises of God? Or does it mean that we have a basis for advancing our sanctification?

See: this is Piper's point, and my point. When iMonk makes the point that perfectionist doctrine goes nowhere, it seems like he and his cohorts/supporters/readers overlook the part where they are willing to admit that someone who is an adulterer in a "glib" way (as he said in the podcast) has a false assurance.

I mean, if you're going to go Luther, even he says, "[the Holy Spirit] works and promotes sanctification, causing [this community] daily to grow and become strong in the faith and its fruits which He produces." If you are willing to say that the adulterer is "glib" in his confession of faith. you have to be willing to ask if anyonbe's sanctification which has stalled out is "glib".

Now, why? Is it because you're (as someone said in the meta last week) trying to snap the bruised reed? Oh good heavens. Listen: there's no question that we will not be finished with sin until the last day -- but think about that in this way: should we be therefore finished with our concerns about sin until the last day?

It is my belief, and my hope, that iMonk would agree with me that the answer is "no way". And the call to die daily to sin is still the Biblical admonition.

Discuss.

Superbowl Hindsight

[1] C.J. Mahaney was mistaken about this year's Superbowl. My opinion is that it was a horserace, it was not what anyone expected, and the Giants beat a team nobody thought they could beat.

[2] I have taken a vow not to make snarky remarks about the gifts of the spirit as they relate to C.J.'s comments as they would come across the wrong way.

[3] In our small group, we had great fellowship, and an awesome time of prayer at halftime. I'll catch Tom petty on some video site this week -- he couldn't match what we had as a small group this last Sunday.

The Ratings thing

I accidentally turned it on in Haloscan, and apparently you people are rating the posts.

Is this a function we want to keep active, or is it merely annoying?

Shaddout Weekend post

Props to my peeps in Latham, NY, Brooklyn, St. Louis, MO, and SAUDI ARABIA!

It's been a long time since we did a map check, so don;t hate me because we're busy.

I Heart Piper

Before this week, I think I'd say, "mixed bag" when it comes to reader of this blog and Piper and leave it at that, but in the meta this week I've seen something I didn’t expect: I didn’t expect to se readers of my blog – or visitors from TeamPyro, which many of you have been – to be merely last-generation evangelicals who would hold to a Billy Graham Crusade view of conversion where a pastor who says that people who prayed a prayer might not be saved is castigated as a trouble-maker.

Here's what Sled Dog (a reader and commenter in the meta) said last night:

[Dr. Piper said] “You gotta make this an issue Sunday after Sunday so that they feel scared that they're not saved."

For me, that's the line that goes over the edge.

The call of the pastor/preacher is to communicate the Word...the whole counsel of God.

The role of the Holy Spirit is to convict.

If I start thinking about scaring people in regards to assurance...that's beyond the call of duty. The Word and the Spirit handle that task much better than I could ever dream of.

Now, let's be very intentional here. This is what Dr. Piper said:

Catch on to the affectional nature of Christianity, conversion. It is not merely a decision to believe a fact. It is a heart treasuring Christ and His glory more than football, sex, money, power, play, toys. You gotta make this an issue Sunday after Sunday so that they feel scared that they're not saved.

You know, I think some pastors are so afraid that somebody might walk up at the end of the service and say, "you really jostled my assurance this morning." If we don't -jostle- people's assurance when they're not saved, we send them to hell.

We must preach in such a way so that people can test -- Test Yourself! 2 Cor 13:5 says, "test yourself to see if you are in the faith". Well, one of the tests is do you love Football more than you love Jesus? Do you love Golf more than you love Christ? What does your heart say about Christ? Late at night, all alone, in front of an internet screen, mouse ready to click, what does your heart say about Christ over pornography?

What Dr. Piper did not say is that people should walk around the world wondering if they are saved or not – which is the impression one gets when one views that one sentence out of context, and is the impression guys like Sled Dog are giving in the meta.

Dr. Piper's point is the wholly-scriptural point that the believer is called to test himself, and see if the faith which he claims he has is a faith which is changing him. As someone pointed out in the meta, it's a matter of knowing by one's fruits what kind of branch one is.

But apparently that's out of line. Some will call it legalism, and others will call it "works-based faith", and some will simply turn their noses up at the idea that people ought to have a little bit of concern over whether what they say is actually what they mean. You know: when I say that I am a child of the living God, adopted into His Household rather than left for punishment where I belong – and that, bought at the price of the blood of God's one and only son – maybe I should act like that really happened and not like it's a political slogan, a talking point, or a t-shirt.

Maybe I should act like there's a real God who really did this stuff and I'm, at least, grateful.

Think about this: if Donald Trump, who is a billionaire egoist, drove through your town and stopped at your house because he saw your posts on my blog, and he rang the doorbell, invited himself in, and handed you the closing papers on your house, the title for your car, and receipts for 10 years worth of utilities to your house paid in advance, what kind of person would you be?

That is, what would you feel? You'd feel something – maybe stunned at first, or embarrassed. But my guess is that you'd feel grateful. You'd feel grateful – and then the question is what to do about that.

And what Piper is asking here, exhorting here, is that Christ has done more for you than the billionaire egoist can do for you, and if you don't feel grateful, maybe you haven't really received the gift. It could be other things – maybe you haven’t considered the gift; maybe you haven’t examined the gift. But to do those things, you have to be somehow awakened to the fact that you ought to make sure you received the gift.

You know, I drove my first car for 14 years, and the morning it wouldn’t start anymore I was a little put out, but a couple of weeks later my wife bought me my new car. And you know something? Every time I get in it, I wonder if it's really mine, and if I deserve it, and if I will take care to show that I am grateful. Not to the car: to my wife – even though I'm the breadwinner in the house. And for the record, I thank God for his generosity that I have it.

For a car. How much more should we think that way about our salvation? And why on Earth would anyone think that challenging people to examine whether or not they are still grateful, and whether that gratitude has any spiritual bearing on them, is wrong? It's not hardly wrong.

Think about who you are this weekend. Be in the Lord's house with the Lord's people on the Lord's day and let your assurance be challenged – because unless your assurance is changing you, unless it is putting your treasure in things which cannot rust and thieves cannot steal, you have a false assurance.

Programing notes

Beautiful. It's January, and apparently that's the baptist liturgiucal season for demanding prohibition. Gene Bridges sent me this link to Les Puryear's blog; Les has compiled the summary of links to Peter Lumpkin's blog regarding Pastor Lumpkin's thoughts on a "useful" approach to making sure alcohol is illegal and never passes the lips of a baptist in an SBC church.

Most helpful to those of you who are really up for this is this link to the book from which Pastor Lumpkin has extracted his argument against alcohol -- a book published in 1857, which is an edited version of a series of lectures by the Presbyterian (!) president of Union College in Schenectady, NY. And let me tell you: there was never a time I was happier that Google started putting public domain books on the internet in PDF format than when I came across this little set of essays by Pastors Lumpkin.

And I thought I had a full calendar already. Stay tuned.