Scot McKnight at Jesus Creed has a lot of good topics going over at his blog. Two of the more interesting series are 1) Women and Ministry and 2) Do Calvinists Understand Arminianism? Check out these posts and follow the comment threads for some interesting reading.

Scot McKnight, Calvinism, women in ministry, theology

Tonight was our offical kickoff of the new school year. Seem late for a kickoff? Well, it seems that way but UCLA just returned to school last Thursday, so tonight was the first time that we had all of our schools and universities in session. I love Wednesday night. I spend most of the day a little stressed out worrying about the night. Is everything in order? Did I get everything done that needed to be done? Is my sermon really ready? But once we begin and the worship band opens the night there is no other place I would rather be. Nothing is more exciting than working with college students. I love watching them mingle, welcome new people, share their lives with each other. I love standing in the balcony or off to the side and watch them worship.

College is definitely a very unique time of life and I am excited for the year that lays ahead of all of us. Tonight was more of a welcome back night so I didn’t give my typical, semi-lengthy message (35-40 mins). Tonight I spoke for about 15 minutes, only sharing one verse with them. John 10:10. “10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” That they may have life, and have it to the full. Or abundantly. What does it mean to live life in abundance? In excess? That is the question I posed to my students. I wanted to really challenge them this year with the choice they really have before them in the beginning of this school year. The choice of life, or abundant life. The choice of life at a mediocre level, or abundantly. The choice seems easy, but it doesn’t always translate that way.

As I talked with the students tonight I challenged them to hold this verse as the focal point of the year. That they would ask themselves what does it mean for them to live life abundantly? Are the choices they make in life, or will make this year, lead to life abundantly, or mediocrity?

As I was thinking about this passage a quote from C. S. Lewis arose to my mind, so I want to leave you with this powerful quote.

“If there lurks in most modern minds the notion that to desire our own good and earnestly to hope for the enjoyment of it is a bad thing, I submit that this notion has crept in from Kant and the Stoics and is no part of the Christian faith. Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.”
CS Lewis, The Weight of Glory

Are you too easily pleased? Are your desires too weak? I think these are good questions to ask ourselves when we think about what it means to live life abundantly.

college ministry, The Quest

Scot McKnight has another great post in his series on Women and Ministry. In his latest post Woman and Ministry: Hermeneutics, Scot says,

Would anyone disagree that slavery is overturned, not by looking at passages that seem to affirm it (say Philemon), but by looking at passages that provide a more central, theological core that transcends even what was permissible in the Bible? Say, Galatians 3:28. What brought Gal 3:28 to the fore was not simple exegesis, but the hard-core reality of the despicable nature of slavery and the ends to which some were taking it. There is ongoing development within the pages of the Bible; does that not keep on going in the Church? What is sometimes only in introductory form becomes more central over time.

Today let’s keep the discussion to this hermeneutical point: that, at times, we learn some practices rooted in some texts are overturned by the deeper implications of other texts.

women in ministry, theology, Scot McKnight

Let me state my thesis: “Central doctrines of Christianity prompted and sustained attractive, liberating, and effective social relations and organizations.”

I believe that it was the religion’s particular doctrines that permitted Christianity to be among the most sweeping and successful revitalization movements in history. And it was the way these doctrines took on actual flesh, the way they directed organizational actions and individual behavior, that led to the rise of Christianity.
The Rise of Christianity: How the Obscure, Marginal Jesus Movement Became the Dominant Religious Force in the Western World in a Few Centuries by Rodney Stark pp. 211

This quote really stuck out to me as I have been reading through Stark’s book. And what really stuck out to me was the phrase, And it was the way these doctrines took on actual flesh, the way they directed organizational actions and individual behavior, that led to the rise of Christianity. This idea of taking on actual flesh is crucial, and the apostle John expresses it in a very beautiful passage in John 1:14, “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.”

God took on flesh in the form of Jesus Christ. And we as Christians live out the doctrines of our Christian faith in the flesh. This is the distinguishing factor between a theology that is simply intellectual and processed in the head and intellect, and one that is actually lived out and practiced. This is something that is very important to me right now because I have noticed a tendency in our college ministry at times to separate our doctrines from our actions. We know what we believe, but we sometimes fail to practice it. This is not limited to college ministry, but is prevalent in the Church as well.

One of the things that I am trying really hard to impress on my college students this year is the importance of their beliefs, their theology, their doctrines, of taking on actual flesh. That they practice what they believe, and not simply leave it to an intellectual pursuit which can be very easy to do in college. College is a lot about life in the classroom, and if we are not careful, our Christian faith in college can be left in the classroom, but not lived out in the dorms, apartments, social circles, work, etc.

My college students very much want to be people who live counterculturally. And I am proud of the way that they often live counterculturally on their campuses. But to live this way requires that we simply just don’t talk our faith. That we simply don’t argue apologetics. That we simply don’t point fingers at who is right or wrong. That we simply don’t judge others. That we simply don’t rebel against theological conservatism or liberalism. All in the hopes of being counterculture. Rather, it is about them, and it is about us actually practicing what we preach to use an old cliche. This practicing of the faith is what Stark believes was one of the most attractive elements to Christianity.

As Christianity found itself in the midst of Rome and a lot of the pagan culture, it was the way that those who called themselves Christians lived, that actually set them apart. It was the way they practiced their beliefs and doctrines that was attractive to Rome and to those in need.

There are many ways to practically live out a countercultural life as a college student during your college years. But the most vital aspect is that your doctrines and beliefs about God and Christianity are lived out in the flesh. That you as a person in the flesh live out those doctrines for those and to those around you.

college ministry, The Quest, Rodney Stark