On Tuesday the Daily Beast website announced the latest Gallup poll findings with this headline, “Gallup Survey Finds a Majority of Americans Still Religious.” Based on 300,000 interviews the survey found that seven out of ten Americans consider themselves “moderate or very religious.” That’s 70% of this nation! The Gallup research “shows basically what American religion surveys always show: the country is overwhelmingly religious, with a very slowly increasing number of nonbelievers, and a slightly faster increase in ‘unbranded’ religious believers” (http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/12/04/gallup-survey-finds-a-majority-of-americans-still-religious.html). “Overwhelmingly religious”—is this cause for celebration? Frankly, I’m grateful for every American heart (or non-American, for that matter) that seeks to find solace and security, even salvation, in God and/or faith. Why wouldn’t that be reason to be grateful? Naturally, none of us knows each other’s soul, and so no one is in a position to determine how many of these seven out of 10 are genuinely entrusting their lives to the Divine (however their religion or faith understands and describes God). But stay with this thought for a moment. A globally influential nation with a strong majority populace that considers itself “moderate or very religious” would be amenable (or susceptible), would it not, to overtly religious appeals or persuasion? I.e., if God and faith are dominant in my worldview, an appeal to me to support or take certain action —if that appeal were based upon God and faith—would gain my attention and perhaps even guide my response. Most would agree that a nation with seven out of 10 of its citizens self-identifying as “moderate or very religious” is a society certainly open to religious appeal. And if that appeal were made by a respected individual or even institution, for 70% of Americans the appeal would be favorably weighted, I suppose. But lest you conclude that to be bad news, consider this. For the last semester we have revisited the biblical description of the apocalyptic endgame just before the return of Christ: “The Dark Night Rises,” “Three Angels, One Warning,” and now “The Morning Star Rises.” Two realities are clear—(1) the endgame will happen suddenly catching most earth inhabitants by surprise, and (2) the final showdown will devolve around worship, worship of the Creator or worship of a counterfeit image of the Divine. The good news is 70% of Americans may be very open to considering the religious appeal that the Creator and His “Three Angels” community of faith must make. Rather than assuming they will all be manipulated by a deceptive religious appeal, why not pray that in fact they will be favorably open to the divine appeal, “Come out of her My people” (Revelation 18:4)? So let the nay-sayers who are decrying a godless Christmas season cry on. You and I can instead pray on—on behalf of the 70% and the 100%—that the Christ who came that starry night long ago and who is yet to come one glorious Day soon—that He might grant to you and me the winsome appeal to reach out for Him, not only to the seven out of ten but to the ten out of ten! Why not?
Pastors' Blog
By Pioneer Pastors
I’m afraid I have to agree with the blogger who commented: “Black Friday—the most embarrassing day of the year for me as an American.” He then embedded in his blog someone’s video clip of shoppers in a real, live melee at Wal-Mart last Friday. Embarrassing? You be the judge (http://libertyblitzkrieg.com/). But perhaps even more embarrassing is the latest sales report from retailers. With businesses opening on Thanksgiving night (kudos to the financial genius who came up with that novel suggestion), the weekend total for US retail sales was $59.1 billion, up 13% from the year before. Because of our massive national indebtedness of $16+ trillion, I realize that the figure you just read may seem paltry in comparison. But look at that number again: $59.1 billion. Do you know how much that is? Who does?! And yet in a nation where 47 million of us now are having to subsist on food stamps, that’s how much Americans spent on their family, their friends and themselves. In just one weekend. “God bless America” indeed! Somebody I overheard this week quipped, “We ought to be celebrating these numbers—after all, sales like these keep Americans working.” Oh really? Do you seriously suppose that American shopping binges are the boon to an economy that is hopelessly in debt. In fact, I wonder how much of this $59.1 billion was purchased by plastic, boosting the already bulging bankrolls of credit card corporations. Keeping Americans employed? Get serious. Keeping Americans in debt may be the most transparent analysis. So how does the follower of Christ relate to obscene spending like the weekend past, and to the impoverished Americans who live all around us in this county? “Listen—I pay my taxes—there are entitlement programs to care for the needy—and besides, whose business is it how much money I decide to spent on Christmas!” Sounds like a third millennial Ebenezer Scrooge to me: “Are there not poor houses for people like these? Then send them there—I will not give one penny more.” Aren’t you glad God is no Scrooge? After all, what is the meaning of this season’s underlying (but awfully hard to hear above the din of the shoppers) narrative? Ever ponder Emily E. S. Elliott’s words in that carol we love to sing? Thou didst leave Thy throne and Thy kingly crown When Thou camest to earth for me; But in Bethlehem’s home was there found no room For Thy holy nativity. Not just “a king” and “a crown”—the story of Christmas is the midnight-splitting pronouncement that The King and The Crown of a billion billion galaxies stripped Himself of throne and glory, and descended to this “dark, dirty” race to save us. And I remind you, we were hardly “on sale”—it was not a good buy—which is why no other buyer stepped forward. Which is also why Christmas and Calvary are forever now inseparable. For in the light that shines from the Face in the cradle, from the Face on the cross, we behold in undimmed splendor “the glory of self-sacrificing love” (Desire of Ages 19). Self-sacrificing love. Black Friday healed by Good Friday. It’s how your heart and mind can yet be healed this Christmas, this very day, right now. As the carol ends, “O come to my heart, Lord Jesus, there is room in my heart for Thee.”
Nathaniel Philbrick, in Mayflower, his acclaimed history of the Pilgrims, recounts how William Bradford, the intrepid leader of that courageous band of Puritans, years later described “that first morning in America.” Recalling with wonder their landing on the salty, windswept shores of Cape Cod Bay on November 15, 1620, Bradford wrote: “But here I cannot stay and make a pause and stand half amazed at this poor people’s present condition. . . . [T]hey had now no friends to welcome them nor inns to entertain or refresh their weather-beaten bodies; no houses or much less towns to repair to, to seek for succor. What could sustain them but the spirit of God and His Grace? May not and ought not the children of these fathers rightly say: ‘Our fathers were Englishmen which came over this great ocean, and were ready to perish in this wilderness; but they cried unto the Lord, and He heard their voice and looked on their adversity’” (46). His words are appropriate, not only because we celebrate the nearly four-century tradition of the Pilgrims’ thanksgiving this week. But in Bradford’s description—“they cried unto the Lord, and He heard their voice and looked on their adversity”—perhaps we also hear the faint hint of a day of adversity yet coming upon this land of the Pilgrims. Could the breath-taking speed with which this nation’s hourly economic headlines are unfolding or unraveling these last few weeks be a portent of what is yet to come? Could this land of the free have already seen her best days? Scribbled on the page of Revelation 13 in my Bible are these words written a century ago: “The Lord has done more for the United States than for any other country upon which the sun shines” (Ms 17, 1906). Hardly a prideful claim of superiority or grounds for national arrogance, this quiet observation simply declares a common truth that this country has enjoyed the uncommon blessings of Providence. And in the sunlight, how easy is the spirit of thanksgiving. But should the days turn dark and the supernal blessings wither away, what shall we be grateful for then? A year after their landing, the Pilgrims gathered for that first thanksgiving—half of their band already buried beneath the Massachusetts sod. Yet they gave thanks to God. And so must we—no matter the uncertain voyage that spreads before us, nationally or personally. The Almighty is still that. And in the darkest storm His mercy will yet triumph. Just look at Calvary. “Oh, give thanks to the LORD, for He is good! For His mercy endures forever” (Psalm 136:1 NKJV).
All that’s left of the election on this morning after is a handful of janitors in Chicago and Boston, sweeping up the scattered confetti or packing it away for another day. I realize we live in a world where life pretty much is defined by winning and losing, the victors and the vanquished. But in all candor, wouldn’t it be glorious if we could come up with a way that would excise the sting of defeat from sports and politics and academics and business and church and relationships and life? You say—but that’s simply the way it is on this planet—you win some, you lose some. Perhaps. But “win-some” it isn’t, is it? And besides, who says we have to? After all in a land faraway and a time long ago there once was a Kingdom where there were no losers. Nobody suffered the sting of defeat or the agony of loss, simply because in that Kingdom the rules of the game were that there is no game. Life is simply a glorious opportunity to spend yourself for the sake and success of everyone else. And so because no one set out to win, nobody had to be a loser. From the throne on down, self-giving was the secret of their happiness and the modus operandi of their peace. But you know the story well—the tranquility of that peaceful and contented Kingdom was shattered the day someone made the dark decision that winning is really what matters most, winning at any cost. Which, of course, also meant losing at a very high cost—a cost so high that it eventually cost the Kingdom a lost planet and a dying King. But before He died, Jesus taught the secret of His Kingdom in those radical words, “‘Whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and the gospel will save it’” (Mark 8:35 NIV). Given this fallen culture, the King describes life in terms of winning and losing. But did you notice, the way to win is to lose? For “‘whoever wants to be great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all’” (Mark 10:43, 44). Gone now the sting of defeat, simply because you refuse to make winning your goal and you choose to make losing yourself in service to others your mission. Why, if every one of us chose to live by Christ’s radical credo, the confetti we’d be sweeping up would always be for someone else.
Does America have a future? Of course it does. But I fear for it. The presidential debate on Tuesday evening reveals a nation sharply divided, each candidate championing the cause of his political supporters. Class division, racial division, economic division, philosophical or ideological division—while it can be argued that every election exposes the divide in our nation, the reality is that this one seems ratcheted up exponentially, no small thanks to the incendiary fueling injected into our national conversation by 24/7 "real time" internet commentary. Consider the potential fall-out from either election outcome. Were the President to be reelected, the hostility of the political right in this nation could threaten governmental gridlock before which the past four years would pale in comparison. Were the President to be defeated, the bitter outcry of the political left could threaten vast swaths of national life through economic boycott and strikes. The truth is that either election outcome could potentially sound the death knell for an already moribund economy. Class and racial divisions? The fallout implications of such potential strife is beyond calculation (but not imagination). I fear for America's future. Does that mean Christian voters, Seventh-day Adventists included, should abdicate their citizenry right and responsibility to vote? Not at all. In the words of our Lord, we must "render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's" (see Matthew 22:21). But given what lies ahead for this nation, irrespective of our political persuasions or private votes, the second half to Jesus' admonition is even more binding, "and render to God the things that are God's." And what belongs to God in a season of such national divide, on the eve of such economic distress? Surely this hour demands our most fervent prayers for this land. "Therefore I exhort first of all that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all . . . for kings and all who are in authority, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence" (1 Timothy 2:1, 2). We must band together to pray for the leaders of this nation and every nation on earth. The unthinkable fallout inevitable with economic collapse portends a chapter neither the church nor the nation is prepared to face. May not God yet spare His people for the critical Three Angels mission that is our raison detre? That is, after all, Paul's compelling reason for intercessory prayer: "For this [praying] is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all . . . to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth" (1 Timothy 2:3, 4). We must pray and labor for the salvation of Americans, for the salvation of the inhabitants of every nation on earth—for all earth children are to be the recipients of God's urgent Three Angel appeal and warning. In my short lifetime I have not witnessed a more consequential season than this one. And so I earnestly pray for the awakening of the church I love and for the salvation of the country I inhabit. And I urge you now to join me in these prayers.
The internet and wire services have been abuzz with this week’s national survey report from Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life. “For the first time in this nation’s history, the United States does not have a Protestant majority” (http://news.yahoo.com/report-us-protestants-lost-majority...). The new study reports that Protestant adults now comprise 48% of the nation. And apparently nobody is surprised. After all, for the first time there are no Protestants on the U.S. Supreme Court or on the Republican presidential ticket. So what’s the big deal? Among other demographic notables contributing to this decline in Protestants, Pew researchers report “a spike in the number of Americans who say they have no religion.” That’s an increase from 15% to 20% of the populace over the last five years. I.e., one out of every five Americans declares “none” when asked to describe their religious affiliation. Is America destined to follow Western Europe into a burgeoning secularism? Over recent years church attendance on that continent has plummeted, leading Pope Benedict XVI to convene this week a three-week synod of bishops from around the world, “aimed at bringing back Roman Catholics who have left the church.” It is clear from Pew research that in the U.S. Protestants, Catholics and Christianity in general are facing a major challenge in retaining their adherents. So what does that mean for a university congregation like ours? Pew finds that “one-third of adults under age 30 have no religious affiliation, compared to 9% of people 65 and older.” That means that the demographic slice of young adults represented by this university is the least likely to pursue religious affiliation. But that does not mean this one-third is godless. To the contrary the Pew category of unaffiliated “encompasses majorities of people who say they believe in God, and a notable minority who pray daily or consider themselves ‘spiritual’ but not ‘religious.’” So what will it take for young-on-young or older-on-young to reach them? Isn’t the strategy Jesus modeled the most effective one for us, too? “The Saviour mingled with [people] as one who desired their good. He showed His sympathy for them, ministered to their needs, and won their confidence. Then He bade them, ‘Follow Me’” (Ministry of Healing 143). For a generation increasingly distancing itself from formal religion, Jesus’ method of growing friendships with those He wanted to reach makes sense, doesn’t it? Drop in on their dorm room, join them at the cafeteria, engage a conversation around their interests, put them on your prayer list, invite them to join you—i.e., set out to win their friendship. Because apparently it’s always been true—the “nones” and the “unaffiliated” will say “yes” to your friendship while they say “none” to your religion. So I say, like Jesus let’s go for the “yes” first—then the “none” will follow.
A few nights ago, Karen and I stood on the portico of the Lincoln Memorial in the nation’s capital. It was this Lincoln who once observed, “It is good policy to never plead what you need not, lest you oblige yourself to prove what you can not.” The adage may be true for politics, but not for evangelism—that divine calling that compels the community of faith to both plead what it must and prove what it can on behalf of Christ’s evangel. Which is why on the next night the Korean Adventist community gathered across this continent as the KNET 2012 satellite series, “A Future and a Friendship You Can Count On,” was beamed from outside the nation’s capital to North America. Two and half million Koreans live in the United States and Canada—15,000 of them Seventh-day Adventists, who are passionate about reaching their compatriots far from their homeland. Thus it was my privilege to stand beside Pastor Don Kim and preach nightly—in English and Korean—to the fifty to sixty downlink sites across the continent. The truth is we were flying on the updraft of ten thousand prayers! The Korean Christian community is known the world over for its deep commitment to collective praying. Korean houses of worship on any continent open early in the morning and close late at night for prayer meetings. As we were preparing to leave our hotel this Sunday for the drive home, a Korean family stopped by to say good-bye. I apologized to them for having to awaken early to meet us before we left. Iris, a young board certified pediatrician at nearby Johns Hopkins, said not to worry, “We were at prayer meeting this morning at 6.” On a Sunday morning? At 6? Korean Adventists believe in the power of collective prayer! And it was clear to me that God honored both their intercessions and their evangelism. Anchorage, Toronto, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Boston, New York City, Chicago, and yes, Berrien Springs—as the nightly reports came in from the multiple sites, our team of pastors and church members at the host site in the Baltimore First church rejoiced. This is the first time the Korean Adventist community has undertaken a project like this in North America. (Previous events were uplinked from Seoul and relayed to America.) And so you can sense the enthusiasm in the air at our site with the large white HOPE-TV satellite truck outside—LA reported 40 guests in attendance and Napa called in with news that nine individuals will be baptized this Sabbath (two reports in English I could understand), and our own attendance in Baltimore grew nightly until Sabbath morning’s full house of worship. The Korean women’s choir, Bistori (“The Sound of Light”)—replete with colorful garb and heavenly music, flew in from LA Friday for the final two sessions. It was a God-blessed event—because you prayed. And so I end this brief report with a personal word of thanksgiving to my home congregation. Your own passion to share the everlasting gospel and your commitment to partner in prayer are two very special gifts for which I continually thank God. And I dream of the day when team after team of young and not-so-young evangelists-to-be are sent out from this campus and congregation to a world that desperately needs to know Jesus. After all, who better to obey His command, “Go into all the world,” than this university named after a missionary, whose bronze arm outside our front door keeps pointing to the lost world that is our mission, too?
That’s what colleges and universities across the land are discovering! Here’s how Justin Pope announced it: “College health officials are finally realizing that healthy sleep habits are a potential miracle drug for much of what ails the famously frazzled modern American college student: anxiety, depression, physical health problems and—more than most students realize—academic troubles. Some studies have found students getting adequate sleep average a full letter grade higher than those who don’t” (South Bend Tribune 9-12-12). Did you catch that? A full letter grade higher! How much sleep will make the difference? Hold on to your seat, because young or old we’re not used to numbers like this. The recommended daily sleep for college students is nine hours a night. Impossible, we all mutter. I know the feeling! Nine hours? Back in the 1960s and ‘70s college students were getting around eight hours of sleep each night. That number dropped to seven hours by the 80’s. And surveys indicate it’s closer to six hours a night these days. We are a sleep-deprived nation, college age or not. But universities are no longer taking these numbers lying down. Campus campaigns, from Hastings College in Nebraska to the University of Louisville, are targeting adolescent biorhythms with campus-wide “flash naps” (an afternoon sleep-in, arranged in advance with public safety so they’ll “know it’s not an epidemic of something”) or beds in the student center from which pajama-clad educators lecture passers-by on the value of even a quick afternoon nap. The truth is sleep loss is more debilitating a practice than we first thought. University of Delaware psychologist Brad Wolgast observes that “many students who think they have attention-deficit (hyperactivity) disorder are often just sleep deprived.” He also notes: “‘When you find depression, even when you find anxiety, when you scratch the surface 80 to 90 percent of the time you find a sleep problem as well.’ . . . (Wolgast is also seeing more students who’ve been prescribed sleeping pills, which he says usually harm sleep patterns more than help”) (ibid). So if you’re having difficulty sleeping these days, why not drop by the campus counseling center. Help is much closer and even simpler than you thought. And what’s not to like about turning some Z’s into A’s? Unless, of course, we’re talking about sleeping through the “last days.” Our now concluding miniseries, “The Dark Night Rises,” is anchored in a single New Testament passage that without apology warns us about sleeping through this climactic chapter in earth history. But Paul is describing a spiritual lethargy and drowsiness, not a physical sleep. “Stay awake and sober” he passionately appeals to his readers (I Thessalonians 5:6, 7). For wide-awake is the divine antidote to a civilization lulled into the “sleeping sickness” of the dark knight. To sleep now is a death trap, Christ Himself cautions (Luke 21:34-36). So “watch and pray.” How? Give an ear to “The Dark Night Rises”—THREE. In the end the good news is that the God who watches over you “neither slumbers nor sleeps” (Psalm 121:4). And when you have Someone who will keep watch with you through the dark night, what’s there to fear, no matter how dark the night becomes?
Now that the brouhahas of the two major political parties in this nation are behind us—namely their back-to-back presidential-nominating conventions—allow me this moment of non-partisan reflection. The longer I live and the more presidential campaigns I survive, the deeper grows my conviction that the life of unabashed self-advancement that seems a requisite to politics these days is blatantly antithetical to the radical call of Christ. Let me hasten to clarify that by this conviction, I am not suggesting that there is no place for the fully-devoted follower of Jesus in politics or in the legislative, judicial and executive branches of government. Joseph, Daniel, Esther, and Nehemiah are compelling biblical examples of divinely-placed believers who rose to highly influential positions within their respective governments. William Wilberforce is a shining example from our “modern” annals. God honors those who honor Him in the realm of service to humanity, including political leadership. But given the political climate in this nation—where 24/7 news cycles hyper-magnify every slip of the tongue and wink of the eye ad nauseam, where candidates and their political action committees spend literally billions of dollars in campaign ads eviscerating their opponents, where ethical standards and moral convictions it seems are banished from the arena of political contest by expediency and greed—you have to wonder how long a Peter or a James or a John or a Mary could survive a run for political office, while maintaining a radical devotion to Jesus and the ethics of His Sermon on the Mount. Perhaps the Prisoner was engaging in more than early-morning banter with the hastily awakened procurator—perhaps in that interrogation Jesus was deftly confronting Pilate, himself a political appointee of Rome, with a higher ethic. It certainly is clear that in these words Christ pronounces the steely truth about those who would take up their own crosses and follow Him: “‘My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would fight, so that I should not be delivered to the Jews; but now My kingdom is not from here’” (John 18:36). And if His kingdom is not from here, then surely His followers live by a morality and an ethic that does not prevail here either—a morality that allows your opponents to nail you to a cross while you seek their forgiveness and reject personal retaliation, an ethic that leads you to turn the other cheek, to pray for those who “despitefully use” you, to love your enemy. No wonder when they came to crown him king, Jesus ran from office rather than for it (John 6:15). No wonder when the devil offered Christ the kingship of this world in exchange for His soul, Christ turned from office rather than toward it (Matthew 4:8-10). No wonder on the eve of His death Jesus spoke a “last word” about political ambition and position by simply instructing His disciples, “‘You are not to be like that’” (Luke 22:26). No wonder you and I have second thoughts about the political discourse of a nation drifting farther and farther from the decency and respectability of our beginnings. And no wonder we will find no savior in the contest this fall.
Could it be it is darker than we’ve imagined? “The Dark Night Rises”—but do we comprehend how dark this night? Two emails—one at the beginning of the summer and the other at the end—have set in motion a chain of thoughts. Maybe for you, too. The first email came from a young friend of mine, a student at this university, who is in Bangkok, Thailand, on a short-term mission: “Hello Pastor Dwight—Doing student missions over here in Thailand this semester has been quite eye opening. Before I ever left I thought to myself that all was good out ‘in the mission field’ . . . however, there are still great needs out here. Before I left I used to think that places like North Korea were the only locations left to be reached by the gospel, yet I’m working here in Bangkok (city of millions) and there is so much need spiritually. Even people in this (what we call) ‘reached’ area have no idea who Jesus is other than some word maybe they’ve heard on the Hollywood movies that roll through here. Sure there are little pockets of missionaries here and there all over the world yet there is SO much work to be done. I’m doing video stuff mostly with a little graphic design, and I’m not in the middle of nowhere. . . . Yes, there are regions out in the middle of the jungle that need to be reached, but people need to realize that there are mission fields in the cities as well. Missions isn’t the typical out-in-the-boonies kind of thing anymore. . . . I suppose my point is if you have a sermon series anytime soon that has any reference to missions or spreading the gospel, tell them the truth. It’s like nothing is happening out here. We need workers. . . . I’m really getting tired of this world. Let’s finish this work. . . . Pieter Damsteegt.” Then a few days ago I received an email from someone I’ve never met. But he and Pieter are obviously on the same page: “Hello Pastor—I’ll keep it short. I’m 25, doing mission work in Africa. From Boise, ID. Preached in my first evangelism campaign last month in the DRC [Democratic Republic of the Congo], in the midst of 20,000 UN troops protecting Goma from attacks by a huge rebel army. Was with a team of 19 other speakers, thousands were baptized, 87 at my site. Will be in Ghana in November for another series with a team of 44 other speakers, and am currently in Rwanda doing work. . . . The teachings [he listens to our podcasts @ www.pmchurch.tv] have definitely reinforced my desire above all else, that God’s Spirit be poured out. So we can ‘tell the world’ and go home. . . . Just a few thoughts on how I see some of this reality: 1) I picture those whom the Spirit has been poured out on will be literally working to spread the Gospel from 4 a.m. to midnight every day. Working on minimal food, but maximum energy. All OTHER things in our lives will need to be dropped at once; 2) Timidness as a characteristic will be nonexistent; 3) Spiritual wisdom will reach new heights for those with the full power of the Holy Spirit. . . . I pray for you, Pastor. . . . Looking forward to meeting you, very soon after the Latter Rain. Trevor Loucks.” Back to Pieter for a moment—in a March blog he unburdened his heart over the lost in Bangkok: “In walking back to the mission compound I could not help but shed a couple tears. Here in the middle of the world there is so much darkness, and the candles that could be out there or any other dark place shining in the darkness are wrapped up in other lighted rooms, if you catch my drift. . . . Whether or not you choose to join the ranks of reaching others and spreading the gospel is up to you, but as long as I have breath in me, there’s at least one more person somewhere that I have to reach, and I have faith that God will lead me to that person.” (http://pietertheophilus.wordpress.com/2012/03/30/you-think-its-happening-but-its-not/) Two young men, one solitary passion even as “The Dark Night Rises”—their eloquence the obvious fruit of their immersion into this world for Christ. But then what more need be said than, “Here am I—send me”?
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