In the Zone

Have you been following the story out of Houston about pastor's being issued subpoenas for sermons and other communications with church members? As I read this , it is pretty scary stuff.  Just to give you a cliff notes version, the Houston City Council passed an ordinance that prohibits businesses with public bathrooms from denying people access to either gender's bathroom.  To put it simply, if they choose, a guy can use a women's bathroom and vice-versa.  It was a bill intended to give transgender people the option to use either bathroom. Obviously, push back occurred and churches led the charge.  They filed a petition to get the issue on the ballot, which was dismissed a midst charges of fraudulent signatures.  The opposition then sued to get the petition validated with led to legal filings.  Part of the legal filings included the city attorney filing subpoenas with five local pastors asking for sermons and any other communications regarding homosex...

One day, when I worked at Jiffy Lube, a customer came in complaining of a horrible smell in her car.  It wasn't oil related, but we weren't very busy, so we agreed to take a look. I'm not mechanically inclined, but several of the other employees were.  (Thank goodness because it was an oil change place.)  They looked under the hood.  They checked all the fluids, the hoses, the brakes and the under carriage of the car.  They found nothing wrong. The smell, however, was persistent.  Sometime definitely smelled funky. Finally, after much prodding and poking, someone pinpointed the odor.  It came from the grill of the car.  After a few minutes, we found the culprit.  A bird had flown up into the radiator and died.  The rotting smell came from it's decay as the radiator heated up.  It carried that smell through the vents of the car. Once the dead bird was removed, the smell disappeared. This parallels what Jesus sa...

As part of my sermon prep, I recently read an article on Bart Campolo. Bart is the son of Tony Campolo, a pastor and author.  Yet, a few years ago, Bart, who followed in his father's footsteps, espoused his Christian beliefs.  He embraced a secular humanist worldview.  He now serves as the secular humanist chaplain at the University of Southern California. In his role as chaplain, Bart does many of the pastoral care roles church pastors and staff do today. According to this Huffington Post article , he envisions a secular humanist community that embraces many of the same services and practices churches engage in today.  He wants to offer inspirational talks, uplifting music, pastoral visits and even potluck dinners. It sounds a lot like church without Christ. Now, I'm going to tell you, I'm not afraid of that.  I'm not afraid of the secular humanist movement, or any other movement, that seeks to resemble church while promoting a different Gospel.  ...

If you've seen the movie The American President, you'll remember this quote : "In the absence of genuine leadership, they'll listen to anyone who steps up to the microphone. They want leadership. They're so thirsty for it they'll crawl through the desert toward a mirage, and when they discover there's no water, they'll drink the sand.” It comes at a pivotal point in the film, when the President's aide is asking him to step up and show leadership.  He wants him to lead the country and stop hiding in the shadows. The same is true for the church today and our doctrine.  For too long, we have hidden in the shadows.  We need leaders to step and lead and teach proper doctrine. That's the gist of Jesus' message to the church at Pergamum in Revelation 2:12-17.  They had done really well at keeping the faith, including enduring the loss of their pastor to martyrdom, but false doctrine was creeping into their congregation.  False teachi...