Scott Fillmer

Linus in his great wisdom instructs Lucy well, sound theology is a great comfort to the mind, but I wonder how that would be written in the 21st century. I try to read a small dose of poetry every day in my quest to understand this complex and powerful form of literature, and this one, “Theology” by Paul Lawrence Dunbar was so funny, sad, and true, I had to share it today. Some days it seems there is such a Christianity culture shift going on in our country that Christians themselves are trying to re-write what it means to be a Christian.

The New Hipster Christian

Each generation sort of does this and re-defines how they see the Church and tries to make it their own, which is fine, better to revive and revitalize the church than leave it all together (which many young people have done too). The danger is when we re-write the Gospel message to meet our pop-culture needs, and turn Christianity into our own personal Jesus (as Depeche Mode put it about a decade ago). Christian theology isn’t something a generation can choose to define, it was defined for us, by Jesus himself.

A recent article in Christianity Today by Brett McCracken entitled “Hipster Faith” (also from his book Hipster Christianity) put it so well. This pretty much nails it.

It’s [hipster Christianity] a world where things like the Left Behind book and film series, Jesus fish, and door-to-door evangelism are relevant only as a source of irony or nostalgia. It’s a world where Braveheart youth-pastor analogies are anathema, where everyone agrees that they wish Pat Robertson “weren’t one of us” and shares a collective distaste for the art for Thomas Kinkade. The latest incarnation of a decades-long collision of “cool” and “Christianity” is in large part a rebellion against the very subculture that birthed it.

It’s a rebellion against old-school evangelicalism and its fuddy-duddy legalism, apathy about the arts, and pitiful lack of concern for social justice. It’s about a rebellion against George W. Bush-style Christianity: American flags in chruches, the Ten Commandments in courtrooms, and evagelical leaders who get too involved in conservative politics, such as James Dobson and Jerry Falwell.

They prefer to call themselves “Christ-followers” rather than “Christians.” They cringe at the thought of an altar call, and the prospect of passing out tracts gives them nightmares.

Nothing is inherently wrong there except I do find that the “hipster Christians” do not give anyone the respect they deserve, like the aforementioned Dobson and Falwell, but I don’t see them giving due respect to hardly any of their “elders” per-say. They may disagree with the method (I always hated the thought of door-to-door myself) but much of their theology is very sound. We all far pray to our own culture, it is just part of being alive. You can follow me and my exploits around on Twitter just like you can McCracken, but where do we get our theology today.

Theology, Get it Wherever You Like

So they/we get theology from CCM (Christian Contemporary Music), and the pop-trends of the day. The latest craze that includes us older generations with Glenn Beck (see Beck Wants to Lead, But Will Evangelicals Follow? and a great article by Dr. Russell Moore God, the Gospel, and Glenn Beck). Beck calls for a return to God, and then on Chris Wallace’s program (see video) Beck made it quite clear that he totally understands the Gospel message, and the differences between the LDS Church (Mormon Church) and Christianity. Sometimes it seems that the only ones who can’t see the difference, and there are plenty of differences, are us Christians.

I guess the question is, who are we looking to for our theological base and teaching, Beck? I don’t want to just pick on Beck, I like his show. While he is a super pop-culture-talking-head and has many good points, should we really be taking our theology from Beck? He would probably even say that’s not a good idea. Luckily, Christians today can go right to the source and skip all the middle men. The unchanging God of Abraham is still there for us. We are the ones who change, not Him.

I was going to post the poem, “Theology” by Paul Lawrence Dunbar here as well but this post is too long already, so look for it in the next post shortly.

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This is not intended to be a another pious rail against gambling from one more judgmental Christian that seemingly has lost touch with the reality of the world, I just simply want to ask the question, “why is the church body sanctioning, supporting, and ultimately using (in some form or another) money given to God, by means of tithe or gifts, given through a servant of a willful heart (2 Corinthians 9:7), to further the cause(s) of Victoryland Casino in Shorter Alabama?  An even better question might be, why if your church does not support Victoryland, does it still continue to use Bingo (or other vainly disguised) “fund raising” techniques like yard sales and the such, but I will save that for another day.

Yesterday the Alabama Supreme Court overruled a Macon County circuit judge’s ruling that blocked Governor Riley’s attempt to raid Victoryland Casino in Shorter, AL (see the full court ruling Order of Protectiong Thrown Out July, 30 2010 and news articles here).  Alabama has traditionally fought gambling of all kinds, and is still one of the last hold out states in the lottery business, but when I read the al.com report’s comments, it just screamed out to me, why are churches supporting Victoryland?  It isn’t like Victoryland is reciprocating and supporting the local church (yes, they did give a whopping 1% to “charity” of some sort).  A quick read of the comments by believeinlord in al.com’s press release shows what is probably one church of many, that takes [chartered?] church bus trips to Victoryland Casino.

This of course brings an enormous host of questions to mind when this person makes the casual comment “I’ve def won my fair share. We go together twice a month with my church group.”  Of course “their fair share” we know statistically means they have spent a whole lot more money than they actually understand (or justify it by calling it the price of having a good time).  The conversation goes on in another article talking about how “bingo has provided money [albeit 1%, yes only ONE PERCENT] to my church when we desperately needed a new van to take our elderly parishioners to their dr visits?”

So, apparently, at least in one case, this church (in Birmingham, AL) is, at minimum, neglecting it’s members, and in “desperate need” of transportation for their elders.  Yet twice a month they trek down to Shorter with their church group? Huh? Seriously?  It is hard to write this post without sounding judgmental but if this group was a “small group” size of say, 20 people, taking 24 trips a year, spending (loosing) who knows how much, is this not enough to completely pay for such a van?

How much is this multiplied across the church body?  Hard to tell.  Most (out of embarrassment or in hopes of keeping their vice quiet), do not directly publicize their casino trips to the general public, but all you have to do is spend a little bit of time in today’s church to know that charter bus trips to Biloxi and Tunica are the norm with many churches.  Even if no church funds are used, is this the association you want people to make with your church?  Today, maybe so, but I don’t find anywhere in scripture where it is the church’s job to support the local community via established casinos.  I wonder if Jud Wilhite’s, Central Church in Henderson, NV sends their small groups to the Bellagio for game night on Tuesday’s?

If you think I am trying to say here that Victoryland, all casinos, and all gambling should end at once, you are missing the point.  My wife and I enjoyed living in Las Vegas for a while, so this doesn’t come from some country hick who never left the back woods of south Alabama. Still, it is one thing to take a private trip with friends or family to a place that has or allows gambling, it is totally different for the church body to sanction such an event.

Don’t scream hypocrite yet, after all, the disciples even casted lots to confirm Matthias as the eleventh disciples in Acts 1:26. Then again, that wasn’t actually gambling, the fate of that cast was already decided by God, it wasn’t an outcome decided by chance.  The point here isn’t whether individuals should or should not gamble.  The point I am attempting to make is that supporting Victoryland is NOT what the church body was called to do, is it?

Are we so bored with the business of being God’s church that this is the best thing we can find to do with our time and money, as a church?  In the world today, we the church have so much invested in our retirement packages, our homes, cars, electronics, can we now only give to God out of our leftovers? Are we once again living in paneled houses, while God’s house remains a ruin (Haggai 1:4)?

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I love it when the church actually is the church.  Paul had such a desire to get to the unreached nations of the world that he probably died on his way to Spain, not in retirement, but with a passion to reach Spain and the world beyond for Christ.  There are many things and purposes for the local church, but one undeniable charge to us from Matthew 28 is to tell those people who have never heard about Christ, the great news of salvation.

This week our church sent the latest team over to Uganda.  After commissioning them on Sunday in the photo above, they were off to Atlanta for 16 hours of flight time through several countries.  We are partnering with a local church in Buloba, Uganda to literally help build the church over there.  It has been such a great long term, ongoing effort, and I know everyone that has gone to Africa has come back with a great exhilaration for what God is doing in Uganda.

If you would like to follow their blog posts while they are over there for the next week, you can read their posts on their blogs at Lee Cadden and Brian Johnson.  Some photos from Uganda taken from Lee’s blog are below, the sunset is looking over Lake Victoria in Uganda, very near where they are staying.  Be sure to check out both of their blogs for the latest.

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Many Ancient Near East writings have similarities to the familiar stories of the Old Testament text; the creation story of Genesis 1-2 with Mesopotamia and Enki, Noah with the Epic of Gilgamesh (text), and the Genesis account of the Tower of Babel in 11:1-9 with “Enmerkar and the Lord of Aratta”.  The Sumerian account that parallels the Tower of Babel is not quite as easy to see, as Gilgamesh and Noah, but it does try to explain where the many languages of the world came from.

The Ancient Near East text called the “Epic of Gilgamesh” is a story that has obvious similarities to the story of Noah in Genesis 7-8.  The epic, referred to as by some, as the “greatest piece of literature to come from Babylonia”, is the story of Gilgamesh’s meeting with Utnapishtim (referred to as the “Babylonian Noah”) who has obtained immortality by surviving a worldwide flood on a boat he built, with his family and all the animals of the world.[1]

There are numerous similarities like the call to bring aboard all the animals and the entire account of the dove and the raven.  The story and its history are important because it predates the Genesis account and many looking for ways to refute the Bible look to this story as proof. If the Gilgamesh epic predates the Noah account then, they conclude, the writer of Genesis must have take the store from the Ancient Near East writing.

There are generally three explanations given.  The Babylonians took from the Hebrew account, the Hebrew account took from the Babylonian account, or each came from a common original historical event.  For a great in depth study of this topic, see the thesis by Nozomi Osanai entitled A comparative study of the flood accounts in the Gilgamesh Epic and Genesis.

Often, in our evangelical churches of today, these writings are never mentioned or referenced, and realistically there is probably little time on Sunday mornings to broach such a deep topic any more.  Still, there is so much to be gained from their readings.  These texts can actually clarify scripture in some cases, as well as affirm our beliefs and understanding of scripture.

The comparison of Gilgamesh and Noah is a good example.  If we follow Osanai’s examples above and conclude that each account came from a common historical event, it confirms, although perhaps not conclusively, the fact that the flood account actually happened.  This may not help or support a case like the exodus where almost all accounts of the Israelites exodus out of Egypt other than the Biblical account are seemingly extent, but that is addressed in a completely different manner scholastically.

As with many topics, this barely even scratches the surface, but is an area often missed in casual Biblical study today, for many reasons, which can yield many benefits.[2] This of course just barely scratches the surface of the question, “How Does Ancient Near East Writings Clarify Scripture” but it opens the door for future study and discussion.

[2] This was an excerpt from a longer discussion on applying the Old Testament laws to our world today.  If the Mosaic Law is revelation from God, how do you explain its similarities to other ancient Near Eastern law codes? What is truly distinctive about the OT Law as revelation from God? What insights are gained from reading Hays’ article on how to apply the OT law as God’s Word today (or deal with ethical issues related to the Christian use of the Law) even though we are no longer under the Mosaic covenant (see Applying the Old Testament Law Today by J. Daniel Hays).  Read Full Text on Ancient Near East Writings post.

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That was the statement our friend Biscuet (he also talked about this great story here) made in his message this morning, no one is actually “called to missions”.   Although this truth rarely seems to be stated in the American church, it is stated in scripture throughout the Bible but most recognizably in the last verse in Matthew.  Jesus was not giving us a suggestion here, it was a definitive statement for His message to reach all nations and to have a heart for those who are living a Spiritually dead life.

Sometimes our Americanized version of missions is to see who is “called to missions” then send them on a sort of mission vacation to a vaguely understood culture, and see what kind of impact can be made.  This might be an exaggerated cynical statement, but those of us who profess Jesus as their Savior are called to a worldwide missionary life.  We are certainly not all called to China like Biscuet but we are called to be missional.

I happen to be reading a passage in a book last night that put this in context.  I am about half way through God’s Passion for His Glory by John Piper which is written in two parts; the first part is a biography on Jonathan Edwards, the second part is The End for Which God Created the World by Edwards himself (see also my essay on Edwards famous sermon Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God entitled Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, Historical Look at It’s Preachability in the 21st Century).  Many don’t associate Edwards with missions but he spent many years working directly with Native American Indians in the 18th century.  In speaking about Edwards, Piper talks about privatism in religion and says:

The worst form [of privatism] is with evangelicals who think they are publicly- and socially- minded when the have no passion for missions of perishing people wihtout the gospel that alone can give eternal life, and without a saving knowledge of the Light of the world who can transform their culture.  So the first message of Jonathan Edwards to modern evangelicals about our public lives is: Don’t limit your passion for justice and peace to such a limited concern as the church-saturated landscape of American culture.

Lift up your eyes to the real crisis of our day: namely, several thousand cultures still unpenetrated by the gospel, who can’t even dream of the blessings we want to restore.

No graphic that I have seen more emphasizes this as the one below from the IMB called You are the Light of the World.  I first saw this in poster form in bslash’s office one day and it has stuck with me since that day.  The dark places in the world, even 2,000 years after Matthew 28:19 was spoken, are large, and on every continent.  Biscuet pointed out today that we, as American’s, can no longer take the Message effectively to a Moslem nation, but we can invest in people who can, like the people in China, but before we can make a huge step (like living in China or Hong Kong), we must be willing to take many many smaller steps and be open to following our Leader, Jesus.

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I only thought yesterday was a long day.  Today was a great day and all I have time to do is just decompress a little bit.  It was a non-stop packed day with Hillsong United from Sydney Australia (I am now an official fan), The Fee Band which came over from Atlanta (who sung their new song “Glory to God”), and a whole host of fantastic speakers like Guy Kawasaki, Andy Stanley, and many more.

I wish I could go through the whole day here but I can hardly keep my eyes open at this point.  I did want to post a few photos of the bands.  The first of Hillsong United, the second is Steve Fee.  I will have to do several more posts at a later date but for now, here are a few shots from today. See more photos of the Steve Fee Band at Catalyst.

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I read a few interesting articles today in Entrepreneur Magazine and Marketing Pilgrim, about how people communicate, and have difficulty communicating, between the generational gaps.  Each generation has a different way of embracing new forms communicating that becomes comfortable to them but where gen-x and gen-y ‘ers seem to have adopted to new forms of communication, the boomers have let is slide and still prefer their face-to-face and over the phone exchanges.

Face-to-Face, Phone, or Twitter-ific

The reports go on to talk about how that makes it difficult to properly communicate between the boomers and gen’ers who don’t really care for face to face and hate making an actual phone call.  All that got me thinking about how we communicate within the church.  Poor communication in a church can kill its momentum, growth, or relationships, but “poor” communication is not universal and what is poor communication from a 20-something to a boomer is acceptable among their peers.

Being Unaware Creates Mis-Understanding

It doesn’t take long to see how mis-understandings in communication methods between generations can cause problems.  As an example, I have found that the farther away you get from the Baby Boomer generation the less an actual response to something is deemed necessary… a response to a phone call, email, sms, facebook comment, tweet on Twitter, whatever it is, the younger you are, the fewer responses are deemed to be needed where the closer to a boomer you are, the more you expect a response to everything.

Where a boomer-ish person is offended by a non-response, the gen-y’er doesn’t even give it a second thought.  Being a Gen-X’er myself, I get quite irritated with non-response but always try to remember who it is I am communicating with, then interpret what their lack of response means.  What it means is that they don’t communicate in the exact same method I do, and I shouldn’t hold that against them when I don’t get a response.

Of course that is a generality and certainly not scientific, but it highlights that an understanding of how each generation prefers to communicate is needed, especially within the church body. If we want the church body to grow, if we want to reach new people for Jesus, we have to understand how the younger generation likes to communicate, what is important to communicate to them, and what they could care less about.  As we all get older, it isn’t about what makes us happy and what we like, right?

Who is the Church Trying To Reach Anyway?

Who are we trying to reach?  If we are trying to reach the Boomer’s, they are probably still looking for those traditional forms of communication from the church like a weekly snail-mailed newsletter, a printed paper bulletin, a pictorial directory of church members, and even those phone calls to the house.  It wouldn’t be a stretch to say Gen-Y doesn’t care a thing about getting something in the mail or receiving a bulletin when they walk in, that just isn’t what they are looking for in a church, it doesn’t add any value to their experience.

They want to share ideas.  They could possibly be the most sharing generation the world has seen, but it isn’t sharing face-to-face like the boomers, it is sharing stories, ideas, life dreams, it is life lived as open source. Even email is unimportant, and becoming less and less important as time goes by.   It is just considered to be spam (even if it isn’t), and sending an email newsletter is irrelevant to the generation that lives on rss feeds.

Produce, but Don’t Push Information

Like each past generation, they want to communicate with each other in the manner they are accustomed to, which is electronically.  They get their information proactively, and don’t want it pushed onto them, this means we have to produce the information and let them come get it.  Communicating things in that manner may seem backwards to traditional means (because it is), and may be more difficult, but push methods will be rejected by the Gen-Y’ers.

So how do we produce information we want them to see and just hope they find it?  Carefully I guess, but I know if it is meaningful enough to them, they will find it.  Word of mouth still rules with Gen-Y as it does with Boomers, so maybe that is the bridge over the generation gap.

Check out the chart below.  I think if we make an effort to understand how each generation prefers to communicate we can better know how to serve each person.  Serving someone in a manner or custom they could care less about it totally ineffective and a waste of everyone’s time.  Wouldn’t it be better to know how best to serve (communicate with) each individual person instead assuming all will respond in the same way?

Learning the Differences, is Important

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I just finished up Killing Cockroaches on the Kindle and started wondering if I was going to be the first Kindle review of Killing Cockroaches?  Of course, you may be wondering why I am holding up a paper copy of Killing Cockroaches but you will just have to wait and read my review of the Kindle coming up for that explanation.

Killing Cockroaches is in a crowded field of church leadership books, written by Tony Morgan from NewSpring Church in Anderson, SC.  At the moment, there are so many books on leadership that I was thrilled to see Tony’s book written and presented in a slightly different format than the traditional chapter by chapter method.  If you love reading blogs like I do, then you will love this book… basically 131 (if I counted correctly) blog posts rolled into one leadership book, all tied together on an overall theme of how not to waste time doing the things you don’t need to be doing in the first place.

Basically we can waste much of our time each day just walking around killing cockroaches (or putting out fires), or we can choose to use the skills and talents we have been given to use in the most efficient way possible.  Tony did several one on one interviews with people in leadership roles in their respective areas which gave you a good sense of how and why other leaders spend their time killing cockroaches as well.

The Little Things about Killing Cockroaches

Some of the other little subtleties I liked about the book were the comic strip of cockroaches running around the book (if you flip through the book like you are trying to make a comic strip move, the cockroaches run around the edges of the book), and the “posts” or chapters were organized in alphabetical order.  I also appreciate the “notes” area in the back, that was very helpful, but I would have loved to have a list of just url’s of all the websites Tony listed throughout the book.  There were tons of them, and somehow I hadn’t been to a good majority of them before now.

Killing Cockroaches: Kindle vs Paper

There actually were a few differences in reading the paper copy of the book and the e-ink version on the Kindle.  Mainly, the thing I liked about the paper version is what I didn’t like about the kindle version.  The cockroaches along the side of the book on the Kindle are translated where they show up in the middle of the page along with Tony’s name and the book name.  This just became an annoyance because it would split a page where there were only a few sentences on one page and then a graphic of the book name, and a cockroach.  This is probably more a Kindle issue than anything else.

Top 10 Highlights from Killing Cockroaches

There were so many little zingers in this book it could be a line by line tweetathon if someone was reading it out loud, but some of the points I took away were:

• Churches that embrace change value some things over others
• change will flow naturally when we empower people to create rather than telling them what to do
• If you’re trying to reach the unreached, remember – your competition isn’t other churches.  Instead it’s everything that’s competing for someone’s time and attention
• Being a bit different is an important ingredient to success
• Your leadership will only go as far as the relationships you’ve built… and no further
• some would note that we are not here for or to entertain but it has to be relevant to their lives and enjoyable
• make sure the guests know, we’re glad you decided to join us, we were expecting you, you matter to us and, more importantly, you matter to God
• competition isn’t the church down the street, it’s any other experience your guests have had
• the sacred cows (like church bulletins): We do it because we’ve always done it… are we worshiping our sacred cows or Jesus?  Does it still add value?
• before you can move others, you must first be moved

If you are intersted in other reviews from other bloggers, Tony has compiled a good list here, Killing Cockroaches Reviews.

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Today was one of those crazy days that started off a little foggy, then things just never rolled into a routine. I spent a good 4-5 hours on I-85 in the back seat of an extend-a-cab truck with four guys on our way to the Unleash Conference put on by NewSpring Church in Anderson, SC. My one instruction from Deb for this conference was to pick up a Clemson tiger for the dog but I am not so sure where in the world I would be able to find one of those guys. Anyone that happens to be in Clemson and is going to Unleash, and happens to have a spare (small) Clemson Tiger, that would be much appreciated.

Most of the staff here at Cornerstone Church made the trip out (in a few different vehicles) and as I write this in the back seat of the truck, one carload is in Atlanta, one is in Greenville, one is behind us by about 10 miles and we are about 2 hours before all of us meet back up at a restaurant for dinner. It is a pretty rare thing for all of the staff to be together in one place at one time, and I am looking forward to catching back up with each of them tonight.

On a side note, if you would like to follow us on Twitter you can do so with the following ID’s for Unleash

• Rusty Hutson – @rustyhutson
• Josh Agerton – @joshagerton
• Jack Fisher – @jackfisher
• Brian Johnson – @bslash
• Amy Coxwell – @aecoxwell
• Julia Farrow – @farrowj
• Scott Fillmer – @scottfillmer

One thing that is really nice about traveling, when you don’t have to drive yourself, is the time you have you wouldn’t otherwise have to do those things you don’t normally get to do, like read in the middle of the afternoon or just sit and listen to some music. I use to travel all the time and miss it quite a bit for the “free time” it provides by nature of traveling. Most that travel a lot get quite bored with it, but in the 10 years or so I did nothing but travel, I always loved it.

Going to Catalyst just a few weeks ago to shoot for the event got me really excited about going to Unleash because I wasn’t going to have to drive. I could actually do something else, like write a blog post and try to finish up Killing Cockroaches (which I did not do). It got me thinking about how much I could get done if I was on vacation, but that sounds like an oxymoron (and I haven’t actually been on an official vacation that I can remember).

One of the guys going with us posed a great question when we piled into the vehicle. What’s the purpose and what are we supposed to learn from by going to Unleash? I starting thinking about what I really wanted to get out of Unleash and realized I hadn’t even given it any thought at all before we got in the car to drive to South Carolina.

What I Want to Learn at Unleash

Communications and Technology – I would like to get a better understanding of how a larger church effectively uses technology to communicate to their church and those not yet at their church

Networking – since I have been working in ministry less than a year I feel like those who have spent their whole life in ministry (which seems to be a lot) already know each other, I don”t, but like every industry, it is a slow process. I hope to meet up with a few people I already met at Catalyst and make some new friends I can connect with once I get back to Auburn.

Leadership – these conferences are always about leadership in the church, but I am looking for some differences between what I have already heard before and what kind of leadership we are looking for in the church that hasn’t made it out of school yet.  I am looking for information about where the church body is headed as far as raising up and developing new leadership for the church that will take it into the next generation.  I am already too old to make an impact as a young leader, but eventually I could make an impact on a young leader.

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Yesterday was about the longest 24 hours I have spent in a long time.  It was a last minute photo shoot request for Catalyst One Day in Atlanta and it was non-stop from the moment we left on Wednesday night until we got back home around midnight last night.  I am still processing what all happened.  This was a full packed day with Andy Stanley and Craig Groeschel as the keynote speakers led by worship with Steve Fee of the Fee Band and several other great musicians.  After Catalyst One Day was over we drove down to Buckhead to the Off the Blogs meeting with Carlos Whittaker, Anne Jackson, Jon Acuff, and Pete Wilson of Cross Point Church with worship led by Aaron Keyes, which was really an eye opener.

At this point I am not even sure how to start to digest the amount of great information that was given out on Thursday, not to mention the almost 4,000 images I shot for Catalyst.  I felt very privileged to get to be around all these minds and just tried to absorb all I could where ever I was at the time.

A friend recently asked if there is a movement going on in the church, and all you have to do is listen to what is going on with some of these churches and you can start to see signs of a broad movement in the Church Body.  Some churches will ignore it, some won’t and don’t know about it because they refuse to change, others are locked in cement and are dying a slow death, but there are churches who are embracing new ways to do things and look at “church” in a fresh new light.

If you missed Catalyst One Day, or the Off the Blogs event after wards, find the podcast, cd, or dvd, and just listen to the ideas and information these guys discussed.  I will set the stage with a few photos here with more to come in the upcoming weeks as I go through the complete edit.  Unitl then, here are a few opening shots of what happened yesterday in Atlanta.  This is the stage at North Point Church and a few of the band members (Steve Fee and Ashley on drums) back stage getting ready for the day.

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