My one powerful conversation with Tony Campolo

 

Today many of my friends and collogues in ministry are sharing wonderful stories of their many interactions over the decades with American Baptist pastor, scholar, and advocate Tony Campolo.  As most of you know, I didn't grow up in Pennsylvania, nor in an American Baptist Church.  Tony's name was not one that I ever heard discussed, in fact I knew little about him until he was invited to speak at First Baptist Church of Linesville (in our French Creek Association) for the Spring Gathering of 2013.  Being new to NW PA and the kind of fellowship that associational events and relationships can offer, I had every intention of attending.  I'll share the text from my 2013 post on the evening next, but after that make sure you read the next portion because there was a lot more to that story that I didn't share back then.

From 2013: This past spring our regional Baptist association invited Tony Campolo to speak at our annual gathering.  The suggested topic for Tony was the problem of complacency among Christians (in other words, what do we do to get people on fire for serving God?).  Prior to going to the event, I received a letter written by one of the pastors of our association and signed by all of his board members that condemned the invitation of Tony and warned us that his teachings were dangerous.  The letter included snippets of quotes from a variety of Professor Campolo's books, many of which seemed to be out of context.  As a former English teacher, seeing quotes taken out of context sends up a huge red flag to me.  I went to the meeting, having heard good things about Tony's presentations from my friends, Pastor Jeff Little (First UMC) and Mother Holly (St. John's Episcopal).

What type of message would we hear?  Would the Gospel be clear or lost in the social efforts that Tony's critics accuse him of replacing it with?

It is amazing what you can learn when you give someone the chance to share what is on their heart.  Throughout his presentation, Tony Campolo gave a heart stirring call to the Church to truly be the servants of Jesus Christ that we have been called to be.  The Evangelical nature of his message was beyond doubt, there at the heart of everything he was preaching was the need for each man, woman, and child to find a relationship with God, through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and to turn that relationship into a life-altering experience of righteous living.  What more could any believer in the fundamentals of the faith want?

The hype, fodder for television commentators and blog posts, was entirely overblown.  The venom directed at Tony from his critics was a farce.  If this man's commitment to the Gospel of Jesus Christ is not genuine, then nobody who publicly declares their faith in Christ can be trusted.  If this man's passion for the Lost is not acceptable to you, then your problem is with the call of Jesus to champion the poor.

Which brings me to his book, Speaking My Mind, which I finished reading today.  I won't claim that everything in the book made me happy, nor am I in agreement with all of it, I will however confirm that the passion for the Gospel I found while listening to Tony last spring is part and parcel of his written works as well.  Are there things in the book that will cause some Christians to write Tony off as a liberal?  Yes.  Are there things in the book that those same Christians need to hear because they echo the words of the Gospel?  Yes.  Do yourself a favor, read the book, think about it, weigh what it says by the scale of Scripture, and then decide what God would have you do about poverty, nationalism, homosexuality, environmentalism, politics, etc.

If you close your mind, you won't be listening to God either.  If you truly are committed to being a disciple of Jesus Christ, don't you owe it to God to admit when you are in error?  Speaking My Mind may not have all the answers, but at least Tony Campolo was brave enough to ask the questions.

Listening to Tony Campolo in-person certainly put to bed any hesitation to think of him as a positive force for the Church today.  He was that and then some.  There are two other aspects of that story I'd like to share now in his memory.  The first is that I went to the gathering at Linesville with Arlene Harrington.  Those from my church remember Arlene fondly, she was the widow of our long-time pastor, John Harrington who served my church for twenty years from 1964-1983.  After his passing she moved back to Franklin and rejoined the church where they had spent so many years together.  Arlene was a pistol.  When I arrived here she told me, "Let me know if you have any trouble with anyone, I lived in that parsonage before you did, I'll handle it."  Thankfully, I never had to take Arlene up on her offer, but I appreciate her passion for protecting me as her pastor.  We had a wonderful conversation on the drive there about how she used to go to French Creek Association gatherings as a child in her parents' model-T.  On our way home after hearing Tony's message we were in the middle of another conversation when I pulled the car over and told Arlene, "I need to go back."  She graciously allowed me to follow what my conscience was saying to me, fifteen minutes later we reentered the church to find Tony still talking with the people that remained.

What made me turn the car around?  During his message Tony had offered up supporting Compassion International as one way in which those attending could make a difference for the Kingdom in this world.  He encouraged us to sponsor a child, holding up pictures of several to inspire us further.  I hadn't responded.  The reason was simple, my wife and I were still massively in-debt from the decade of multiple part-time jobs that I had struggled through in Michigan before we moved here.  The math just didn't work, that's what my mind told me.  We were living without much fluff, I couldn't justify $30 per-month, I just didn't have it to spare.  But God spoke to me as I drove away from the church, it wasn't an audible voice, but it was real, it was a gut-check moment, and I responded to it.

I told Tony this when there was a break in his conversation with the others who remained, and took one of his cards.  I don't remember the words we exchanged 11 years ago, I just remember the impact that his passion for those in need had on my heart.

There is an epilogue to this story.  My wife Nicole told me she was pregnant in the Fall of 2014.  As previously mentioned, we were still trying to claw our way out of debt, perhaps 50% of my paycheck went to that cause each month.  I knew we'd have to tighten our belts even further, and that's what we did.  I didn't want to, but I called Compassion International, told them what we were facing, and let our then 18-month-old sponsorship lapse...Fast forward to 2019.  We had finally put our debt in the past, our beautiful daughter Clara was 4 years old, it was time to find a way to sponsor another Compassion International child.

That's Sonite.  She's the child that my daughter chose to sponsor.  I showed Clara pictures of a dozen or so girls born on the same day that she was, and she chose this precious child from Haiti.  Clara and Sonite exchange letters, our small connection to her life circumstances teaches my daughter valuable lessons about how blessed we are in life and our obligation to share some of that blessing with the many in our world who are much less fortunate.  It is one of the ways that we're trying to mold Clara into the kind of kid whose heart and mind beats like that of Tony Campolo.  

"Well done good and faithful servant."

Sermon Video: Having Grace in Disputable Matters, part 3 - Romans 14:15-21

Having established the need for grace in the areas of Christian liberty about which we disagree with our brothers and sisters in Christ, Paul now turns to the need for love to limit that liberty if exercising it were to cause harm to fellow Christians.

How can it harm others if I follow my conscience with respect to disputable matters?  Two key ways: (1) The who have "weak" faith my imitate you, even though their conscience tells them that they should not, it then being an act of rebellion for them, or (2) those who disagree may look upon your choice as sinful (even though it is not) and have their faith damaged by your seeming hypocrisy at tolerating sin in your life.

In the end, Paul's command to us is to not allow our preferences in non-moral issues to ever bring other believers to harm.  Proactively we must look out for each other and be willing to restrain our freedom if it will help the faith of other people for whom Christ died.

Christianity has always been a self-imposed Cancel Culture, on purpose

Few ideas are as controversial in this moment in American history as the notion of a Cancel Culture.  Firebrands and pundits on both the political Right and Left are up in arms either calling for those on the opposite side to be 'cancelled' or decrying that someone on our 'team' was cancelled by 'them'.  Both sides seem immune to the irony that they're playing the same game while yelling that the game isn't fair.  That being said, and without making any particular recommendation as to how we as a country get out of this ever deepening Culture War (aside from an Armistace where both sides agree to stop fighting, which seems unlikely given how much power and money is to be made on both sides by those who wage it), it occurs to me that this moment could also be instructive regarding the nature of the Church in particular, and Christianity in general.  You see, it may come as a surprise to some, but the Word of God, both the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Testament, repeatedly calls for the people of God to 'cancel' their own involvement in immoral culture by not participating in it.  God was calling for boycotts long before anyone considered them as an economic/political tool.  This is not a call for seperation from the culture, for both Israel and the Church are called to be a light to those 'living in darkness', but a call to voluntarily avoid those aspects of culture that lead to temptation, particularly temptation to lessen our commitment and devotion to God.  Examples abound, here a few to illustrate the point:

Deuteronomy 18:9-13  When you enter the land the Lord your God is giving you, do not learn to imitate the detestable ways of the nations there. 10 Let no one be found among you who sacrifices their son or daughter in the fire, who practices divination or sorcery, interprets omens, engages in witchcraft, 11 or casts spells, or who is a medium or spiritist or who consults the dead. 12 Anyone who does these things is detestable to the Lord; because of these same detestable practices the Lord your God will drive out those nations before you. 13 You must be blameless before the Lord your God.

One of many places where God emphasizes to the nation of Israel that they must not be like the Canaanites, that in fact God's judgment upon the collective culture of the tribes that inhabited the land at the time of the Exodus was to purge the land of them lest their evil practices become a snare of imitation to the his covenant people (which in fact it did in future generations, repeatedly).

Leviticus 18:24-28  Do not defile yourselves in any of these ways, because this is how the nations that I am going to drive out before you became defiled. 25 Even the land was defiled; so I punished it for its sin, and the land vomited out its inhabitants. 26 But you must keep my decrees and my laws. The native-born and the foreigners residing among you must not do any of these detestable things, 27 for all these things were done by the people who lived in the land before you, and the land became defiled. 28 And if you defile the land, it will vomit you out as it vomited out the nations that were before you.

How serious was God about this warning?  Very serious.  If the Israelites failed to maintain a culture, using that term as a catch-all for the collective behaviors and choices of the people, that honored and pleased God while avoiding the very things that their neighbors did which caused judgment upon them, God would drive evn his own people from the Promised Land.  In the end, the ten northern tribes, known at the time as Israel, where conquered by the Assyrians in 722 B.C. and dispersed among that empire's peoples, and the two southern tribes, known as Judah, were sent into a seventy year exile in Babylon in 586 B.C. precisely because they continued to indulge in idolatry, sexual immorality, and failed to provide for the unfortunate among them (typically referred to as widows, orphans, and foreigners as they were the most likely to need charitable help).  God took the requirement of a much more pure people than those living around them very seriously, when his own people failed to live up to this standard he judged them and didn't hold back.

When Christ founded the Church and set forth the New Covenant, it was clear that he intended his people to be 'in the world but not of the world' a phrase inspired by Jesus' answer to Pilate:

John 18:36  Jesus said, “My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jewish leaders. But now my kingdom is from another place.”

How could they do that if they lived scattered among the nations, in many cases as a minority?  The answer was to be 'salt' and 'light' wherever they happened to be, acting as both purifying and illuminating agents.

Matthew 5:13-16  You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.  14 “You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. 15 Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.

How then can that 'saltiness' and 'light' be maintained?  How can Christ's followers be different?  The presence of the Holy Spirit as a counselor is of course key, as is the renewal of the hearts/mind/spirits of God's people known as regeneration.

Titus 3:5  he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit,

2 Corinthians 5:17  Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!

Romans 12:2  Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

The work of God in us is the beginning, a necessary beginning, but moving forward Christians are called to avoid the things in life that lead to temptation.

Colossians 3:1-8  Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. 3 For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

5 Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. 6 Because of these, the wrath of God is coming. 7 You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. 8 But now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips.

And what are Christians, individually and collectively, supposed to replace the immoral aspects of the particular culture in which they happen to find themselves with?  The answer isn't specific, but a set of principles and qualities that should occupy our hearts and minds.

Philippians 4:8  Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.

As this quick examination of relevant scriptural passages indicates, Christians and Christianity were intended to be discerning of participation in culture, an exercise in self-control and restraint that does not end when Christians went from being a minority to being the majority in a culture, or vice versa.  What particular aspects of culture one chooses to participate in and what one chooses to abstain from is an ongoing conversation that requires both a knowledge of God's Word and a discerning heart to apply it to the present day.  This conversation takes place on an individual basis with our own conscience, and on a collective basis as a local body of Christ or Christian community in general.  Our response to culture is not achieved through a list of rules, which will be obsolete as soon as the ink is dry, but by teaching ourselves and others to evaluate our choices according to Christian principles, shunning that which is immoral and embraces that which is righteous.  

The Roman Empire utilized worship of the emperor as a means of unity within their diverse and far flung empire, but Christians refused to participate in this behavior because it violated God's commands against both false worship and idolatry.  As a result, during the first few centuries of the Church, Christians faced both sporadic and organized persecution, sometimes resulting in imprisonment or death, that tried to force them to join in.  Some gave up their beliefs to save themselves, others held firm and became martyrs.  In the end, after Constantine, the Church was on the road to creating the rules, not defying them.

As Christian Americans, whether aligned with the political Left or Right, we need to ask ourselves an important question: If 'they' came for 'us' and forced us to abandon or 'Christian culture' what would they really be taking?  What do we think, say, and do that is distinctively Christ-imitating?  How much of what we take in and put out through our hearts and minds reflects the Fruit of the Spirit, and how much is just our preferred portion of the culture in which we live, not really Christ-reflecting at all?  These are hard questions, and many of us wouldn't have much that is distinctively Christian to give up if 'they' forced us to.  Here's the thing, 'they' shouldn't have to force you to walk away from the immoral aspects of our culture, Christ has already commanded you to, the Spirit has already convicted you of it, and your ability to be 'salt' and 'light' depends upon it.  A Christian 'Cancel Culture'?  Yes, its called self-control.

Is the 'Cancel Culture' coming after racists?  That shouldn't have anything to do with us.  If it hits one of 'our people' shouldn't we want to know why?  Are they coming for expressions of sexual immorality or greed?  Why is that hitting so close to home?  Maybe we need to be asking ourselves how 'Christian' the culture we've embraced really is.

Hobby Lobby ruling by the Supreme Court

Regarding the Hobby Lobby ruling...Why was Hobby Lobby able to successfully make their case before the Supreme Court?  Because the Green family had DEMONSTRATED their Christian beliefs clearly over time through the policies that their corporation enacted.  When's the last time a corporation was acknowledged as having clear moral values?  Hobby Lobby pays its employees twice the minimum wage, is closed on Sunday to give employees a day of rest and worship, has long provided health care in a business where most employers did not, and pays for full page advertisements at Christmas and Easter honoring Christ.  In case you're wondering, all of those decisions by the Green family cost them money, but because they were the right thing to do, they did them anyway.  Anyone who knows anything about Hobby Lobby knew they were run by a Christian family.  Can your business say the same, can your family? 
Being a Christian is not something for Sunday only, it should be obvious and clear to all that you are a follower of Jesus Christ, and not because you're loud or obnoxious about it, but because you show the love of Christ in how you live each and every day.  As Jesus told his disciples, "whoever acknowledges me before men, the Son of Man will also acknowledge him before the angels of God." (Luke 12:8)  What does it say about you if people who know you reasonably well would be surprised to learn that you're a Christian?  On the other hand, it says a lot about the love of God when people who don't even really know you still know that you're a Christian because you've built up a reputation for honor, integrity, charity, patience, kindness, etc.  The Supreme Court decided that family owned corporations don't have to pretend that they're not led by Christian values, what's keeping you from doing the same about your life and your family?

The Church in America

The history and character of the Church in America is a fascinating topic.  It is to be expected that the American culture and political system being so different from that of the Europe from which most of its early settlers came, would be reflected in the Church as well.  The Church in Europe has a tremendous amount of historical baggage to carry on its shoulders; from the massacres of the Thirty Year's War to the disillusionment of the WWI generation.  The rise and fall of nations and dynasties became so intertwined with the aspirations of Church movements that the two could hardly be distinguished.
Yet when immigrants stepped off the boats at one of America's colonies (and later at one of the United States' cities), everything was different.  At first, the American colonies were a mixture of toleration (Rhode Island, Pennsylvania), dissident churches (Massachusetts' Puritans and Quakers), and transplanted state churches (Maryland, Virginia).  These fledgling institutions, whether they intended to offer religious liberty or not (most did not), were soon overwhelmed by the flood of newcomers representing every imaginable variation of Christianity that existed in Europe.  Even those who hoped to make a particular colony, or later the United States itself, into a bastion of one church over and above all others could see that their cause was hopeless.
The religious liberty that we take for granted as a part of the American character was not the ideal that most early settlers embraced (the Puritans of MA helped Rhode Island get started by driving out dissenters; something they were used to being on the receiving end of back in England, but did anyway when they had the chance), with a few exceptions such as William Penn, but it was an inevitable outcome of such diverse immigration.  It seems that God was intent upon nudging our American ancestors into choosing to respect each other's religious liberty whether that wanted to or not.
The interesting postscript to the American Christian experience is the contrast between the nearly empty state sponsored/endorsed churches of Europe and the still vibrant independent American Church.  It is no coincidence that deprived of the power and money that government control brings that Church in America has been strengthened by the voluntary support of its members.  Today Europe stands in desperate need of revival and the balance of Church growth in the world has shifted to the Third World; the question that remains is will America recapture its history of revival and collectively renew the Church here, or will we follow in Europe's footsteps and turn our churches into museums too.

Sermon Video: Restraining Sensual Indulgence - Colossians 2:20-23

Do groups that attempt to isolate themselves from the world, like medieval monks or the Amish of today, hold the key to holiness?  What is the value of self-denial (Asceticism)?  Paul explains why this belief is misguided and ultimately fails to accomplish its goal, the restraint of sensual indulgence.

To watch the video, click on the link below:
Sermon Video

Which Bible Translation do I use?

One question that always seems to get asked of those like myself in the ministry is, "What Bible translation do you use?" For some, this question is a litmus test, a way to determine if the two people in question are on the same "team"; for others, this is merely one of those issues of curiosity akin to asking a pro-golfer what brand of club he prefers. Much has been made over the years by those who have staked out a King James ONLY position. These partisans of the King James Version have declared all users of other translations to be at best 2nd-rate Christians, at worst hopeless agents of the Whore of Babylon (somewhat tongue-in-cheek, but I've been called things to that effect). Unfortunately, that position itself is wholly un-Biblical, has no basis in the scholarship of translation, and assumes that 99% of those who claim Jesus Christ as their Savior are somehow mistaken. So much for a Church against which the Gates of Hell shall not overcome.
As you can tell, I am NOT at King James ONLY believer. By the same token, I don't have anything against the King James Version beyond the difficulty that arises when you try to use it to reach the un-churched. (For its poetic beauty and its influence on Church history, the KJV deserves to be kept in the mix to be sure)
I myself use the New International Version when I preach and for my personal study because of how readily the meaning and message of the Gospel are conveyed through its modern English. When I put the weekly PowerPoint together and choose the opening and responsive Scripture readings I typically check the KJV, NIV, NASB, and NLT to find the one that speaks to the sermon's message the best (and I usually try to rotate my use of the major translations to demonstrate my own acceptance of them).
In the end, the truth is that we are BLESSED with an abundance of excellent and trustworthy translations in English such that we should never consider ourselves to lack the true Scriptures (compared to some languages which have one or no translations of the Bible, what are you complaining about??) Every translation of the Bible into English is one man's or a committee's attempt to render the original Greek (and bit of Aramaic) into English. Anyone who has ever translated ANYTHING into another language knows that more than one English word (and sometimes several) can be used to convey nuances of the single word from the Greek. Some translations try to be word for word; others go for the meaning behind the words. That debate, while interesting, is immaterial to the question of whether or not we have the true Bible in English. We do, end of story, no question about it.
So, the next time someone asks you, "Which Bible translation do you use?" go ahead and tell them. Don't be worried about your answer, the important question is not which Bible you use, but that you do use it and learn from it.