Sword Saints

Power play

For further evidence of the marginalization of the Christian faith in American life, we turn to The Washington Post's Reliable Sources column (scroll down to "Who's Got the Power? A Mag's Surprising Answer"):

Almost halfway down the rankings we find a man so influential he only needs a one-word name. No, not Nelly or Usher, who are way up at the top of the list. We're talking about Jesus. That's right: He is the 21st most influential man under 38.

Which raises the question: Who's bigger than Jesus this year? The No. 1 spot goes to the Abu Ghraib prison scandal soldiers, who are clearly meaner than Jesus. The Google guys, Sergey Brin and Larry Page, claim No. 2 for being richer than Jesus. No. 3 is MoveOn.org visionary Eli Pariser, who helped raise the Dems from the dead, which frankly might have been a tall order even for God. Clocking in at No. 4 most powerful is White House communications director Dan Bartlett, who probably could have offered advice on keeping all four Gospel writers on message.

The editor admitted that the inclusion of Jesus on the list was "partly tongue in cheek," but was also a nod to Mel Gibson's movie The Passion (but no mention of whether Mel himself was on the list) and the political power of American evangelicals. Of course, I can't blame pop culture icons or magazine editors or anyone else for the marginalization of Jesus. I can only blame myself and my witness to the watching world. If my life shows no evidence of radical transformation, there is no power that anyone can see. If I am not compelled and motivated by His love, there is no power that anyone can see. If I do not rest on His mercies for all things, there is no power that anyone can see.

Do not be conformed ... but be transformed ... or He will seem powerless.

Asking myself, "Is this good for the company?"

It's not that I'm rebellious for the sake of being a rebel. I only bristle when I'm told to do something that I think is ridiculous. It's just part of being who I am. Nonsense decisions annoy me. But I'm just a grunt, so what do I know? Mine is not to question why, mine is but to do and get paid.

So we're hopping a plane to Mexico to visit the manufacturing plant. We're supposed to be there checking out the boards they're building for us. If the boards work, we'll have about two hours of work to check 'em out, and then we'll ship 'em back to HQ for integration testing. If the boards don't work, then we've got about thirty minutes of debugging to try, after which we'll ship 'em back to HQ for more extensive debugging. Either way, we're limited by our equipment down there and the boards end up in our lab here.

At least the hotel has free WiFi. And rumor has it there are some good breweries in the area. I guess I'll just start thinking of it as a working vacation.

The plain truth of the Gospel

The crew started a new study last night, this one on the banner of the Gospel (132.3K PDF file). We started here:

Therefore, since through God's mercy we have this ministry, we do not lose heart. Rather, we have renounced secret and shameful ways; we do not use deception, nor do we distort the word of God. On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly we commend ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God.

We used the beginning of the Gospel of Mark as our commentary on these verses (I like using Scripture as its own commentary). It was interesting to get everyone's take on just what the plain truth of the Gospel was. From our adoption as sons of God (as illustrated by the voice of God at the baptism of Jesus) to the transition from death to life in Christ to salvation by grace through faith to the imputation of an alien righteousness, our views seemed to be all over the map. Yet they all highlight an aspect of the Gospel message -- that while we were sinners, Christ died for the ungodly so that we might become the righteousness of God and be reckoned as children of the King.

Sprawling

Bad news for us suburbanites:

Warning: Suburban sprawl may be hazardous to your health. A report released Monday found that people who live in sprawling metropolitan areas are more likely to report chronic health problems such as high blood pressure, arthritis, headaches and breathing difficulties than residents of more compact cities.

The difference ? which remained even when researchers accounted for factors such as age, economic status and race ? may have something to do with the way people get around in more spread-out cities.

"People drive more in these areas; they walk less," said Roland Sturm, co-author of the report by Rand Corp., a nonprofit research group.

The report suggests that an adult who lives in a sprawling city such as Atlanta will have health characteristics similar to someone four years older, but otherwise similar, who lives in a more compact city like Seattle.

Argh! As if turning thirty wasn't bad enough, now they're telling me I've got the health characteristics of someone who's thirty-four?

I'd love to walk or bike to work, or to the almost-completed grocery store that's halfway between home and work. My commute is under three miles. Half of that is a winding, narrow, two-lane road with big marshy ditches on the side of the road. The other half is traffic-encrusted main drag that has about four fewer lanes than it should. None of it has sidewalks, or bike paths, or anything that would be friendly to people without cars (not that any of it is friendly to people with cars, but still). Add insane north Atlanta drivers to the mix and the only sane choice is to strap yourself into your shiny metal box and rush into the race.

Suburban sprawl and cubicle life. What a wonderful combination.

Not-so-strange bedfellows

For some reason, this doesn't give me the warm fuzzies:

The Rev. Jerry Falwell boasted Friday that evangelical Christians, after nearly 25 years of increasing political activism, now control the Republican Party and the fate of President Bush in the November election.

"The Republican Party does not have the head count to elect a president without the support of religious conservatives," Falwell said at an election training conference of the Christian Coalition.

Why am I suddenly reminded of Jesus' woes on the Pharisees? Why am I reminded that these same Pharisees manipulated the Roman government so that they would execute Jesus? Why am I reminded that these same Pharisees hounded and hunted the fledgling church? What type of evangelists have we become? What is the good news that we are spreading? Is it the good news of passing new laws to keep our moral advantage? Or is it rather that in Him we become the righteousness of God?

Equipping the pilgrim

It was a great weekend for thinking about the plight of the pilgrim in this world. Cartoon Network showed the final four episodes of Samurai Jack interspersed with the Star Wars: Clone Wars animated shorts. Samurai, Jedi, good versus evil. Pilgrims in the world fighting their way to their goal. How cool is that?

During this morning's sermon on running the race as a follower of Christ I was reminded of the scene where Jesus sent out the disciples:

And he called the twelve and began to send them out two by two, and gave them authority over the unclean spirits. He charged them to take nothing for their journey except a staff--no bread, no bag, no money in their belts--but to wear sandals and not put on two tunics. And he said to them, "Whenever you enter a house, stay there until you depart from there. And if any place will not receive you and they will not listen to you, when you leave, shake off the dust that is on your feet as a testimony against them." So they went out and proclaimed that people should repent. And they cast out many demons and anointed with oil many who were sick and healed them.

He sent out the disciples with a minimum of equipment -- a staff, sandals and the clothes on their back. He equipped them with His very life and with His teaching and instructed them to leave the things of this world behind. But how does that translate for us? And what does that have to do with cartoons and samurai and Jedi?

Samurai Jack travels through the world with nothing but his clothes, his sandals, and his sword. The Jedi in Star Wars protect peace and justice throughout the galaxy with their robes and their lightsabers. Miyamoto Musashi in The Samurai Trilogy wanders the land with his clothes and sword after "converting" to the way of the samurai. And likewise, the disciples were sent out to minister with nothing but their clothes and a staff.

I wrote something related a while back. I wonder if the fact that we have so many sources of equipping at our disposal -- books, seminars, sermon series, retreats, etc. -- does little more than distract us from what we really need. After all, what could be more important than the Word of God when it comes to equipment for our pilgrimage?

New links on the blog

I've added a few new links in the recent past. Bart Garrett is ramping up over at Edge of Faith. You can take a listen to some righteous tunes over at Aaron Shust's page. Conrad Gempf posts his thoughts over at Not Quite Art, Not Quite Living. And Bill Higgins moved the brick house over to Blogger.

Give 'em a visit and drop some encouragement their way!

Second Reformation, take two

I just finished reading Chapter Two of Second Reformation. It ties in well with some of my recent thoughts on the purpose of the church.

[Update: And if you're wondering what I'm doing reading this in the middle of a work day, I'm in the process of doing a long build. That means time where I'm not coding and have no executable to test. Recess, in other words.]

Run for the border

Meh. Everyone's walking by my cubicle now, "Hey, I hear you're going to Mexico." Why am I always the last to know about these things? Like it's a treat or something. Like traveling for work is ever a treat for a software grunt. Like a seemingly irrational trip is supposed to make me all giddy. Ah well, Monterrey is probably quite lovely this time of year. And as long as I can come home with some Kahlúa from the duty-free store, it won't be a complete waste of a trip.

God gap?

We listened to another fine episode of Speaking of Faith this week, Beyond the God Gap.

The theory of the "God gap"?often broadly suggesting that religious Americans are conservative and will vote Republican while non-religious Americans are liberal and will vote Democratic?has been prominent in press reporting and political maneuvering in the 2004 presidential race. At their recent conventions, both parties seemed to grapple with faith dynamics and respond to the perceived God gap in interesting, unexpected ways.

Krista speaks with Steven Waldman, who covered the 2004 Democratic and Republican conventions for religious messages, images, and language. He says that, strictly speaking, the God gap is a myth. We'll look beyond the headlines about the political gulf that reportedly separates religious and secular Americans.

One thing I noticed in watching the conventions was that the Republicans tended to be more comfortable with expressions of faith. There was a good deal of religious rhetoric at the Democratic convention, but I thought most of them wore it like it was an ill-fitting sweater.

The whole "God gap" thing apparently comes down to church attendance, according to Mr. Waldman's conversation on this program. Those self-identified Christians who attend church more often are much more likely to vote Republican. Those who do not tend to vote Democrat. Things like belief in God, prayer, and reading the Bible appear to be similar across party lines. So what is it about church attendance that makes people more Republican? Are American churches turning Christians into moralists/legalists?