Stillness at Pepperdine

I find myself in the beautiful Malibu, California at Pepperdine University for the Pepperdine lectures.  I speak on Friday on one of my favorite axioms or Spencerisms, “the Church is the Hospital for soul sick people”…at least it should be.  Church isn’t, nor was it ever supposed to be a country club or place we come to pretend we have it all together.  “Church” was always intended to be the place for messed up folk who need Jesus to change them from the inside out.

For me personally, I am not here to listen to other lectures.  I am excited to present, but I am far more interested in what God has to say…to me.  Psalm 46:10 says to Be still, and know that I (He) is God.  I am practicing being still.  That may seem strange to some of you, but “stillness” is not something I am good at; and probably some of you as well.  As a new friend from Australia so aptly pointed out yesterday, we Americans are so busy…so interested in accomplishing the next thing…making something happen.  I think he’s right…Guilty as charged…we are so busy I think some of us (being nice in not making an over-generalization) are so busy, we just miss God coming and going.  So, I am here to listen.  To be still.  To read, and pray, and seek, and wait on God.  More later.

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Fire Breathing Pagans

You will often hear me talk about unchurched (no or little church background) or dechurched (formerly churched, now not affiliated) people as we talk about getting out and engaging with the world. Unless you have lived in one of those worlds or are close to people living in those worlds, you may not realize how much unchurched and dechurched people often look like us…Christian Churchgoers. That statement might be hard to hear…even appalling to some of you since Christians are supposed to be “the light of the world” and “the salt of the earth”. After all, we are supposed to be significantly different from the lost and unchurched world.
Before you give up on reading this blog, let me explain. In our everyday lives, churched people and unchurched or dechurched people walk similar paths. Most all of us are concerned about our families. Certain moral values such as cheating or adultery are usually not dissimilar. They work alongside us and their children play with our children. Some of these unchurched and dechurched people are our children’s teachers and doctors. The unchurched and dechurched live in our neighborhoods and carry on pleasant conversations with us. They often have the same financial burdens or concerns we do, they are just as patriotic, and most of them react with the same sadness when they see a sick child or person in pain.
The problem is, many churches often speak of unchurched and dechurched people as pagans; as if they are fire-breathing aliens from another planet. Many see the unchurched and dechurched as angry or hostile at Christians, doubtful of the existence of God, and bitter toward the church; however, the reality is, that based upon research and personal experience, about 95% of unchurched and dechurched people don’t fit this description.
It is true that there are a fair number of people that hate God and everything we stand for, but the vast majority of people we meet everyday are not actually anti-church or anti-Christian. Many of them need a friend to see that not all Christians are crazy if they have had this experience. Many of them have had bad experiences with church and simply need a loving guide to show them that Brussels sprouts are a terrible way to judge vegetables (talk to me if you don’t understand my analogy). Many of them don’t realize how much of a support system a loving church can be. Many just don’t think church attendance is important or at least they think sleeping in or mowing the grass is more important. Many of them are simply waiting for an invitation to church.
Rather than looking at the unchurched or dechurched as diseased or better yet, fire-breathing pagans, let’s consider getting to know them. Find out what makes them tick. Invest time and energy in them. And then show them, by your own life and words, what a Christian looks like…an image that accurately reflects the one we serve…Jesus!

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So What’s a Sciolistic?

I love unusual words; however, I hate it when people use them and don’t explain them.  We do this in church all the time…we use “Christianese” that most churchgoers are familiar with (although I would guess many don’t fully understand some words us preachers like to use) but CEO’s (Christmas and Easter Only) and pre-Christan attenders most likely don’t understand what we’re talking about half the time.

So, in the explanation of this blog, I used the word, “Sciolistics”.  A sociolistic is someone who shows a very superficial demonstration of learning or it is someone who never even thinks about matters of faith.  This is different than a skeptic, cynic, or critic.  How would you define skeptic, cynic or critic?

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