Constantinian Snore

A few days ago, Randy and I were in the SMC library reading for the History of Christianity class. Other students were there, and the library was less than quiet. We persevered, reading section after section. At one point, we paused because a student at another table wanted to talk to us. At yet another table, a small group of students was having a conversation. One of them asked Randy what we were studying, and he replied, “Constantine.”

The questioner was a bright student with a passion for speaking about his faith. Thus, I was somewhat (but not totally) surprised when he responded with a fake snore, indicating that learning about Constantine was boring and irrelevant.

I would not call Constantine a stimulating voice of theology or spirituality, but he played an influential role in the establishment of early Christianity.

Constantine favored Christianity and provided many benefits to the followers of Jesus. At a time when Christianity could have vanished, God used that emperor to prolong its existence. Had God not used Constantine in that way, I wonder (1) if Christianity would have survived and/or (2) what other vessel God would have used to sustain the faithful followers of Christ.

At the time of Constantine, different groups of Christians disagreed about some fundamental principles of the faith. From early on, Christians had held two important beliefs. First, God was one. Second, Jesus was God. These beliefs resulted in an obvious question: What is the relationship between the Father and the Son?

Two Christian camps proposed early solutions to this problem. Adoptionism said that God the Father “adopted” Jesus (the Son) at some point after his humanly birth (possibly at his baptism). Sabellianism suggested that God was one and manifested in three forms (Father, Son, Spirirt), one at a time.

Those early schools of theological thought led to two church leaders who offered two conflicting views. Arius taught that God was one and unique, that the Son was subordinate to the Father in two ways (not co-existent and not of the same substance), that the Son was the perfect creation, and that the Son took on a human body but not a human spirit. Athanasius critiqued Arius and taught that Christ needed to be fully human and fully divine for humans’ salvation and that, therefore, the Son was the of same substance as the Father. (Thanks to Dr. Pratt for these insights!)

Constantine, the emperor who at that time was supporting the church, needed to know which group was the true church. His action in this matter quickened when he learned that his close friend, the church historian Eusebius, got caught in the conflict. Thus, the emperor ordered a council to be held in Nicaea in 325. The council’s decision favored Athanasius and condemned Arianism.

The council at Nicaea is known as the first ecumenical (universal) council of the early church, although its participants were almost exclusively from the Roman Empire (Robert Bruce Mullin, A Short World History of Christianity, 65). It decided that Christ was of “one substance with the Father.” Athanasius prevaled; Arius lost. Church leaders would continue discussing particulars.

Much of Christian theology’s understanding of the Father-Son relationship comes from this early episode in church history. Regardless what you think about Constantine and his impact on the church, we must agree that he played a key role in encouraging the early church to decide between two conflicting theological views.

Does this mean that the victor in the council at Nicaea was perfectly and eternally correct? Not necessarily. But without the council, Christianity may have splintered into a thousand pieces and lost both its coherency and its imperial support.

Of course, people have questioned whether Constantine was really a Christian. People also have yawned and even snored at his role in the history of Christianity. Nevertheless, God used him to continue the church’s existence. Through that process, the church took a major step in determining what Christians believe.

Persecution, Bribes, and Sandwiches

The early church suffered persecution at the hands of government officials. That persecution came in spurts. In his book A Short World History of Christianity, Robert Bruce Mullin reminds us that “there was no systematic campaign by the Roman authorities against the Christian community until the middle of the third century.”

The situation shifted during the reign of the emperor Decius. He insisted that all citizens of the Roman Empire show their loyalty to the government by sacrificing to that culture’s gods and get certificates documenting their submission to the decree. Christians could lose all their properties if they refused to sacrifice to the gods, but offering such sacrifices was contrary to their faith. Some Christians chose to comply with the demand for sacrifices. Some chose not to do so and suffered imprisonment, exile, and even execution. Others bribed officials in exchange for falsified certificates.

After Decius died in 251, the crisis lessened. However, when Diocletian came to power 33 years later, persecutions intensified. He began a major campaign against followers of Jesus, dismantling places of worship, arresting church leaders, outlawing Christian worship, and ordering Christians to hand over Bibles, worship books, and other valued items to the government. This attack on Christianity is known as “the Great Persecution.”

Like in the persecution under Decius, “the Great Persecution” under Diocletian resulted in compromise. Some Christians refused to surrender their sacred texts. Others chose to give the emperor what he wanted. The latter group became known as traitors in the Christian community. “In North Africa the church became bitterly divided over the fate of the traditores, and the division would have momentous consequences” (Mullin, 48). In the midst of this large-scale attempt to quench Christianity, the faith grew dramatically.

Jump ahead to January 26, 2010. At our weekly men’s lunch today, one brother shared that his extended family has a heated division between members who prefer hot submarine sandwiches and those who prefer cold ones. I said that I would be in the hot sub camp, but he clarified that I would be a traitor because I was at that moment eating a cold sub. I’m glad that church leaders don’t debate my fate as a traitor because of my sandwich choices!

I don’t mean to trivialize the traumatic experiences of persecuted Christians in the late third century. They were concerned with matters much more important than sandwiches, and the risks of disobeying the government’s commands were much more severe than anything I must fear as a Christian in the USA of 2010. However, Christians in some other parts of the world do suffer extreme persecution today, as The Voice of the Martyrs will gladly inform you. I pray for those persecuted people of faith and invite you to do so as well.

Where’s the Van?

As I arrived at my car with a shopping cart of groceries in the Walmart parking lot this afternoon, a well-dressed gentleman passed by and said, “God bless you.”

“How odd,” I thought. I like receiving blessings, but strangers don’t usually say that to me unless I’ve just sneezed.

I knew what was coming. The man initiated a conversation with me. I was in a hurry, but I stopped and listened.

The stranger asked me, “What church do you attend?” Again I thought, “How odd!” I answered. Then he told me that he was Dr. So And So (I can’t remember his name) and that he was the pastor of So And So Church (I can’t remember that either). He said that his church van, loaded with people, was out of gas and at the side of the highway just a few blocks from the parking lot. He wanted me to help.

I’d already confirmed that I was a “church-goer,” and I’m sure he’d read “Abilene Christian University” on my sweatshirt. But I smelled something fishy. How was I to respond?

I replied, “Dude, if you work for a church, you know that we don’t give away money.” That is a common policy for churches and many individuals who care about people in need. People can abuse money, but that is not my reason for not providing financial assistance. (Actually, I sometimes give money, but maybe I shouldn’t, and I’m decreasing that practice.) My reason is that, whenever a person or an organization gives money to someone in need, countless other requests are likely to come. Plus, while people can abuse cash gifts, they are less likely to abuse gifts in other forms, such as gasoline and food.

A question entered my mind, but I kept it to myself. Why was this minister leading an out-of-town trip without any money for emergencies?

I told the man that I could get some gas and take it to the van. I verified the vehicle’s location and asked if he needed a ride. He declined the ride but welcomed the gas. I told him I needed to go to my house, which was nearby, to get my gas container.

After getting the container from our storage room, I filled it with a couple of gallons at a gas station and drove to the specified location, wondering what I would do if the man had been fibbing and attackers awaited my arrival. I hid my cash and debit card as I left the station.

When I arrived at the scene, I saw no van. I drove a few more miles, still not finding it. Then I backtracked and even checked a few miles of an intersecting highway. No van was sitting at the side of either road.

Thankfully nobody robbed or attacked me, and now I have two gallons of gasoline to put in Tamara’s car after I post this.

Keep serving, my friends. Sometimes we get to help in real ways, and sometimes we don’t. But we press on.

“Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares” (Hebrews 13:2 ESV).

My Cyclical Relationship with History

When I arrived as a freshman at Abilene Christian University in the fall of 1997, someone told me about the school’s honors program. I met with the program’s director, and he informed me that I could join the program but, in order to do so, would need to take at least one honors class that semester. The first day of classes was quickly approaching, and my options were quite limited. The only honors class that fit my schedule and wasn’t full was U.S. History I. Without hesitation I registered for the course.

My high school performance had been decent, and I might have been an “honors” student in some areas, but not in history. I had excelled in languages, mathematics, and sciences; but in my history classes I had done little reading and studying and watched many football films.

The professor in this first history class of my collegiate career was a friendly man who liked telling stories and did so exceptionally well, even bursting into song once or twice. I enjoyed listening to his teaching, but the course material was over my head, as was the work load. They weren’t extreme for an undergraduate honors class, but they were much more demanding than my high school history classes had been.

The night before my first exam in that college history class, after regularly reading like a responsible student and paying attention and taking notes in class, I did a final review of the material. My classmate who lived across the hall from me in the dorm didn’t even open the book until that night, but he would end up scoring higher than I on the test. My heart would cry, “Not fair!”

I persevered through that class and ended the semester with a respectable grade, but I still was far from being an honors history student. Later in my bachelor’s degree, I took two more history classes at ACU, experiencing similar frustrations. Then, in my senior year, I studied for a semester in Oxford, England.

I had been interested in ACU’s study abroad program for a few semesters but had not applied to participate because I didn’t have any way to finance such an adventure. At the end of my junior year, I decided that if I was ever to take advantage of the opportunity, I had to do so soon. I discovered that I could take out extra student loans to cover the expenses.

The study abroad program was designed to provide ACU classes taught by ACU professors in a British context. That did not excite me, and the program director worked out an arrangement by which I could take two classes in the ACU study abroad program in Oxford and two classes through the Oxford Centre for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, taught by faculty members of Oxford University, a Mecca of higher education. I was on board.

In the fall of 2000, I took two ACU-in-Oxford classes: Christian Worship and a class about British culture. I also took two tutorials through the Centre. [The Oxford culture uses the term "tutorials" for what we call classes or courses, and the term "courses" there refers to fields of study in which students emphasize their studies (what we call "majors").]

My two tutorials were in philosophy of religion and the development of doctrine in the first four centuries (i.e., early church history). For each week in each tutorial, the professor assigned me a topic. Then I spent hours upon hours (sometimes up to 20 a week for each tutorial) searching aged and musty libraries, reading about topics previously unknown to me, and writing a seven-page essay, laying out various views on the topics and presenting my own take on the subject. Then I printed two copies and met one-on-one with my professor. I read one copy out loud while the professor followed along with the other copy and made comments in the margins. When I finished reading, the prof asked me several questions, listened to my responses, made a few suggestions, and assigned the following week’s topic.

That Oxford experience was the most straining and stimulating of my academic life, and it taught me the value of history in our attempts to understand life today. How did we get to where we are? Why do we have the beliefs that we have? How did we come to perform various practices the way we do? History helps us explore these and other questions.

I had grown from being afraid of history classes to being a fan. Then I took three history classes in graduate school: one in the history of American thought, one in the history of African Americans in the Restoration Movement, and one in the history of Christianity from the Reformation to the recent past. By the time I took those classes, my era as a responsible student had faded away, and I struggled through those courses, attempting to juggle academic assignments with other obligations that competed for my time and energy.

Furthermore, in History of Christianity II, I wrote a research paper about an episode in the life of my current community. I thought it was a cutting-edge work, but my professor said it lacked sufficient analysis. His comment puzzled me, and I decided that history, although interesting, was not my field of specialization.

However, I found my field of specialization: campus ministry. This form of service combines my love of God and my love of college students. It keeps me intrigued and never bored, and God works through my feeble efforts to orchestrate eternal transformation in the lives of young adults.

When I moved to Spartanburg to start a campus ministry, my experience in the field was minimal and only as a student, not as someone paid to lead. I had some experience in church leadership and had worked a few jobs on college campuses, and I welcomed an opportunity to integrate those experiences in a new endeavor.

I consulted several campus ministers in order to learn more about what God had called me to do, and one of those mentors told me about something he had done when he was a young campus minister. He audited some classes to meet students. When he shared that experience with me, I didn’t think I should audit a class because I was still trying to finish the last requirements for a second graduate degree.

My last required class for that degree was last summer, and this semester I’m auditing a class at Spartanburg Methodist College. I get to sit in the class, learn from the professor, read some interesting materials, and spend time with students. I don’t have to take any of the exams or write the term paper. If I get behind on the reading assignments or need to miss a class, it’s OK because I don’t get a grade. What an opportunity!

What’s the class? You guessed it; it’s a history class! Specifically, we’re studying the history of Christianity. That’s right–about 2,000 years of history in one semester.

And in the absence of deadlines and graded assignments, I am finding an increased appreciation for history. We’ve discussed only the first small part of a large story, and I’m already finding points of connection between faith long ago and faith today. Christians of old dealt with some questions that continue to perplex us, and they made decisions that still impact us.

In the next several weeks, this blog will probably provide random reflections from this next chapter in the story of my cyclical relationship with history. I have liked it and hated it, admired it and resented it. Now I’m giving it another chance, and I pray that the Holy Spirit will use this opportunity to move me closer to God and to the students I love.

Helping Haiti

Surely you have heard of the powerful earthquake that devastated Haiti earlier this week. In case the Spirit is moving you to help, here are some good options to contribute financially:

Global Samaritan Resources. One of my best friends, Randy Uthe (BSN, RN, MDiv), works as a full-time missionary with this organization that provides holistic aid, including disaster relief, throughout the world. This afternoon I called GSR and spoke with Dr. Ed Enzor. He said that, for the Haiti situation, GSR is collecting funds specifically for food, water purification, and shipping.

Christian Relief Fund. Dr. Milton Jones, who has long been active in the national campus ministry scene and now preaches for a church in Amarillo, serves as this organization’s president.

White’s Ferry Road Church of Christ. This congregation in West Monroe, LA, has a strong history in organizing disaster relief in the name of Christ.

Jesus helped people in need, and I trust that God will bless your giving in his name.

Without Words

This morning I received an email from my colleague. The subject line caused me to pause. “Tragic News – Prayer Request.”

I don’t go to the hospital every time a church member or someone related to a church member is there. Ernie and the elders do a fine job providing that sort of pastoral care for the general congregation. I typically respond to such a situation if the patient or a family member of the patient is part of the campus ministry.

This time I felt a tug. God used something inside me to make me want to go, but I simultaneously didn’t want to go. I didn’t know what I would say or do. I didn’t know if my presence would be a help or a hindrance. Surely many friends and family members were already there.

Nevertheless, I felt an urge to go. Perhaps God gave me that nudge because I have a little more of a relationship with that family than I have with some other non-campus-ministry members of the congregation.

I waited. After replying to a few more emails and doing my morning reading, I ran a personal errand and went to the office for a weekly men’s lunch. There we prayed for this family and their 16-year-old patient suffering serious injuries following a car wreck.

I stayed at the office for a while, sorting through mail, posting some ministry announcements, and doing several less-than-crucial tasks, putting off the soul-push to visit the hospital.

Then I asked Audrey, our office manager, if she thought I should go. I told her about my hesitancies, and she assured me that my going could let the family know I cared.

I drove my car down the driveway and turned onto the main street near the office, not yet knowing whether I was going to the hospital or passing it on my way to a coffee shop. The car turned into the hospital parking garage.

When I arrived in the waiting area near the NICU, I saw two of Jessica’s step-uncles, both active workers in the church. We greeted each other and shook hands. They appeared tired, and I didn’t know what to say, so I simply asked, “How is she?”

You can guess the response. Matt told me they had just learned that Jessica “didn’t make it. She’s gone.”

After years of education in ministry and communication and over a decade of ministry experience, my heart sank, and I didn’t have anything to say. I mumbled an “I’m sorry,” knowing it was insufficient.

I stood with my brothers of faith for several minutes. There were many periods of silence and a few comments about what had happened and what the family needed. Through the awkwardness, though, they let me know that they were glad I was there.

Why did I not know what to say? Why could I not decide what to do? What would my grief ministry professor say about this scenario?

Another professor once said that sometimes the best thing to say is nothing; sometimes the best thing to give is silence; sometimes the best thing to do is to be present.

I’m not satisfied. I want to be a better minister, a better friend. But such a situation is not about me. My focus is on the family in pain and the God of comfort who is willing and able to guide them on their journeys of grief.

I don’t know why I’m blogging this. Maybe I shouldn’t take your time with a personal story that lacks an obvious point. I feel an urge to put the experience out in cyberspace for you to read, so here it is.

May the God of comfort and peace be with you–when you hurt… and when you don’t know what to say.

Whose Resolution?

Last December, PreachingToday.com posted revealing statistics regarding New Year’s resolutions:

Almost half of USA citizens generally make New Year’s resolutions.

Only eight percent of the nation is “always successful” in achieving resolutions.

24 percent of the national population makes resolutions but always fails to achieve them.

Most resolutions in the country pertain to education or self-improvement.

Other popular resolution topics concern weight, money, and relationships.

More information related to New Year’s resolutions appears in today’s edition of the Odessa American, the local newspaper in the small West Texas city where I’m visiting family and eating plenty of steak and Mexican cuisine. The article shares “expert” suggestions for successfully achieving resolutions:

A resolution should be specific and singular. Vague resolutions and attempts to accomplish too many goals are likely to fail.

Resolutions “should be broken down into individual steps,” and writing them down can help.

Resolutions should be “specific, measurable and time-bound.”

A common characteristic I see in most New Year’s resolutions is a high level of egocentrism. Perhaps Christmas is the time when we (hopefully) think about God, while New Year’s Day is when we focus on ourselves.

How can we use New Year’s Day as an opportunity to honor God instead of self? Instead of committing ourselves to resolutions to make ourselves better, maybe we should align ourselves with God’s resolutions. They are the same every year and are both more ambitious and more promising than any resolutions we could make for ourselves.

Thus, I encourage us once again to use resolutions to shape our actions and passions by the healing, reconciling Missio Dei.

To whose resolution are you committing yourself in 2010?

Porn and Progress

As responsible travelers, Tamara and I had some spare time when waiting for our flight Monday morning. I agreed to watch our luggage while she explored the small airport. Then she returned to our base of operations, and it was my turn to wander.

After selecting a strange coffee beverage, I searched the gift shop’s wall for a magazine. I didn’t want just any magazine, but a specific one–The Economist. I couldn’t find it, so I asked the cashier. After a brief pause to think, she reached to the customer side of the counter and handed me a copy.

I was embarrassed and unsure whether I should hide it, run away, or simply thank her.

The Economist is a highly respected magazine (or perhaps I should use the publication’s self-label of “newspaper”) of international news, largely about economics and politics. This issue, however, features an artistic portrayal of Adam and Eve sharing an iPod in the Garden of Eden. The artist dutifully placed leaves over the genital areas of the two human bodies, but the picture exposes their upper parts.

This blog post is not about pornography, nor is the article to which the topless Eve directs browsers’ attention.

The unidentified author begins by referencing “The Tragedy of Man,” a poetic story Imre Madach of Hungary published in 1861. That parable re-imagines the Garden of Eden and follows Adam through millennia. After he sees horrors of human behavior, he abandons all hope of progress and decides to jump off a cliff to his death.

Then “he glimpses redemption” in two forms. Eve tells him she’s expecting, and God encourages him not to measure his accomplishments on such a large scale. The ghost journalist summarizes the parable: “All God asks of man [sic] is to strive for progress, nothing more.”

The article also refers to Susan Neiman, “an American philosopher living in Germany,” inviting readers to think past the assumption that we must choose between “Utopia and degeneracy.” “Moral progress,” points out the journalist, “is neither guaranteed nor is it hopeless. Instead, it is up to us.”

As a Christian, I believe that progress is more up to God than up to us. However, my Christian faith also leads me to embrace the human responsibility to participate in the progress which God is doing. Our theology tells us that God is in the work of healing the brokenness of this world and is bringing about a “new earth.”

This Friday is New Year’s Day, a time of resolutions. If you make resolutions for 2010, I pray that God will guide you to make ones that are in line with that progressive mission and will strengthen you to fulfill them. The progress is up to God, and our participation is up to us. Glimpse the redemption.

Give Away

Christmas quickly approaches. I enjoy some extra time to read and write. Tamara and I share a relaxed evening together. I meet a colleague for lunch, successfully hunt for my last two gift purchases, plan for some ministry events in the new year, and listen to music.

In the world of Christmas songs, I prefer the classics. But some newer ones catch my ear as well. Some I like, and some I don’t. One stumps me. I can’t decide if I’m a fan of it or not.

That song is “Give This Christmas Away” by Matthew West. While I enjoy some of West’s songs, the sound of this one doesn’t particularly attract my favor. However, like most of his works, its message is helpful.

“Give This Christmas Away.” What does that mean?

For Mr. West, it means “feeding the hungry, serving the poor… telling the orphan, you’re not forgotten anymore… doing what love does, even when no one’s watching you.”

Those certainly are good deeds, but why should we do them? And why does the Christmas season lead us to focus on such acts of kindness?

The song answers the first question. We should do these things because of what God did for us. God gave us the Son, showing us divine love. That’s why West encourages us not to let the love just stay in our hearts, but to find ways to give it away.

The answer to the second question lies in our society’s concentrated attention to the birth of Jesus Christ at this time of year. Perhaps in December more than any other month, millions of world citizens are listening to Jesus-centered messages. Sometimes those messages reach our hearts and behaviors; sometimes our consumerism and selfishness crowd our souls and don’t leave room for more beneficial messages to reach us deeply.

I pray that the message of Matthew West’s new Christmas song can spur you to seek God’s guidance in how you might be able to “Give This Christmas Away.” Maybe you’ll get to participate in an effort to provide gifts for children in needy families or without families. Perhaps you’ll find an opportunity to serve in a soup kitchen. You might have a chance to comfort someone to whom Christmas brings loneliness, grief, or other pain. Whether you can do anything like these suggestions by this Friday or not, I hope you can share God’s love with people in need at other times throughout the year.

The ears of my mind turn to another song–not a Christmas one, but an old hymn. Frances Havergal penned the words in 1858; and despite the now archaic language, the message still rings true and relevant. “I gave, I gave My life for thee, what hast thou given for Me?”

Studying?

Yesterday I had lunch with students in the cafeteria of a nearby college campus, where the stress of finals and excitement of Christmas vacation were strong.

After eating, I wandered to the library. I browsed some new books and then ascended to the second floor, where I settled into a chair and read for about forty minutes.

A group of three students were sitting at a table near my chair when I entered that section of the building. Some books and papers were on the table but weren’t receiving any notice from the students, who talked, laughed, and texted. About 20 minutes into my reading, one of the students answered a call on her cell phone. After a second or two, she spoke into the phone, “We’re in the library studying.” About 10 minutes later, the students packed up their belongings and left the room, having not done any studying for at least the 30 minutes I had observed them.

Sometimes students think they’re studying when they really aren’t. Then they wonder why they don’t perform as well on exams as they had wished.

However, we mustn’t chuckle simply at students in this regard. What good thing are you doing? Are you really doing it, or do you just think you’re doing it? How can you know? How can you do a better job of actually doing the good you want to do?

Romans 7:15

God, please help me to do the good I know I should do and sometimes think I’m doing when really I’m not.