God's Cosmic Staircase

God’s Cosmic Staircase

Christianity would seem to disagree with the ability to really know ourselves (at least to some degree) because "the heart of man is deceptive and wicked beyond all measure." We can know ourselves, but we often choose to lie to ourselves because we’re inclined to desire that a more Humanistic theology ultimately prove true (which doesn't make it true. The christianese term "post-modern" perfectly describes this inclination.)

The forces of the "world/flesh" tell us a lie, that "mankind is basically good at heart" but this is a falsehood. Scripture tells us that we are all affected by Original Sin (which is why there is no human without sin, not even one--because our sin nature was passed down through a lineage of flesh. This is the reason that Jesus Christ was conceived in a virgin and by the Holy Spirit--to break that chain.) Yes, we can do good things, but no human has lived perfection. Ultimately we are a sinful, evil-inclined species with the tendency to perform evil acts and with infinite potential to do good.

The problem is that we confuse that potential as our actual pre-disposition. Our modern culture, controlled by a deceived generation (of which even I am a part... I'm just 29) downplays the idea of sin. "What's the big deal if I do a few bad things; I'm not as bad as Hitler or the sex offender down the street!" We tend to view things in terms of comparison and we don't fully understand the implications of our sin that we so readily trivialize. It was, after all, only one sin that ejected humanity from Eden (one tiny rebellion severed our relationship with God). The price of just one sin is eternal death.

God is Holy, and because of a human tendency to anthropomorphize Him, we think that God is more like us than He really is. We so often think of everything else in human terms (because of people’s base narcissism,) and find it difficult to see things from another's eyes until we have experienced that; as the human race progresses to “modernity,” we’ve gotten far worse at empathy. We forget that he cannot tolerate even that one sin--Holy means "Set apart and beyond/above." God remains above and sovereign in his justice; choosing to sin is a human act that willfully (albeit sometimes unknowingly) de-elevates us from his presence, causing separation.

Holiness literally means to be separate from. I compare it (and the concept of sanctification,) to being on a staircase with God waiting at the top. We walk up towards Him, becoming more and more like Christ (His Son) in our Christian walk. We do as Jesus said and demonstrated, as historical Jewish culture teaches us, in following the footsteps of a rabbi. We imitate our leader, trying to become a version of that rabbi we emulate (which is the literal meaning of Christian: "little Christ.) As we ascend those stairs, we come to several landings. Sinning is when we jump off the staircase and land on the ground (which often hurts us, especially the higher up we are,) back at ground zero.

Remember Original Sin? It points out how we all start this walk on the ground level and that we won't even begin the climb until we believe in our destination. Nobody can climb the staircase if they don’t know where it ends and rely on God's Holy Spirit to help us on that journey (to essentially give us access, to help us onto that first step.) Sanctification is the journey upwards: the act of becoming holy in our personal lives, and true holiness is only achieved at the top of the stairs.

It’s an incomplete analogy and not theologically deep, but I don’t want to overload anyone. It’s not intended to be a perfect example, but hopefully it is relevant. God bless.

Jared Allen is my own personal Jesus

(click here for the video blog version)



Jared Allen is my own personal Jesus

Not really. Please understand that I’m using creative liberties with that statement. Jared Allen is a football player for the Minnesota Vikings, my favorite football team (and source of constant consternation.) Jared Allen happens to be one of my favorite players of the game.

What I really want to discuss, here, is my approach to evangelism. I utilize what is commonly called relational/relationship evangelism. Many people, especially people of an older ministry/evangelism paradigm don’t really know what this means. I have even had people make accusations that I am not open to the power of the Holy Spirit because I’m relying on a “method” or some new “model” to save, rather than the power of God… that is absolutely not what’s going on, but I want to lay some foundation on how evangelism works with today’s culture (and by works, I mean to imply is the most effective versus older methods.)

I’m really on a larger topic (that is, the seeming clash between the “younger” church and the “older” church) because it negatively impacts me at the core of my ministry. Because of that influence, I’m actually going to write a sequential series of posts on that topic. “Relationship Evangelism” lays the groundwork; this is a worldview approach and I want to define it and give it some clarity because the purveyance of “Christianese” buzzwords, some people who don’t fully understand it have relegated it to the same realms as prosperity doctrine or other false doctrines and faulty methodology. We Christians are very good at saying no to things, especially those things that cause change through personal growth.

Everything that I do in my ministry, from big events and topics to sermons and little conversations falls within the category of “evangelism.” This “method” challenges the old paradigm of a “salvation event.” Similar to the idea of Progressive Sanctification, the idea that we become more and more like Christ as we walk through this journey of life, my approach views salvation as a journey from complete lost-ness, to the road of sanctification… it’s the first leg of the journey, that is.

I reference the NFL because we can de-Christianize this topic by comparing the issue to football. There is nothing wrong with “Christianese” if we are talking with people who are familiar with the lingo, but let’s face it, most of us (even devout believers) get more excited when our team scores six points on third and long than when a rebellious teenager gets saved. (We scream thank God, a touchdown! But mutter, let’s see how long it lasts, to the latter.)

Lets say that you are really into football. The NFL is your own personal religion; Brett Favre is your Messiah and John Madden is his prophet. (Bear with me for the sake of the analogy.) Imagine a number scale with a 0 in the middle, a –7 on one end and a +7 to the far right. This is our scale where we can determine commitment levels to any topic, but specifically matters of faith. One day, you a meet a young child who knows nothing about this football that you just told him about. He is perfectly ignorant about the topic so his current involvement with football is at –7; the child is interested so begins to move closer towards 0 (the number where the scales begin to tip.)


Since we’re picking on good old #4 anyway, lets name this child Brett. One day, you tell Brett about the rules and show him how to throw a spiral. Brett agrees to watch a game with you. He doesn’t have a favorite team, or really understand it all, but he enjoyed the fellowship and is still interested in learning more about this football thing. Brett is somewhere closer to a –3. He may take in a game with some friends, he knows a little of the lingo and could keep up a conversation about a punt or field goal, but he won’t go out of his way to watch a game.

Eventually, through exposing Brett to your passion, he begins to develop a love for the sport. He gets excited about it and picks a favorite team. He knows the rules and Brett would even venture a strong guess (and often be right) over what the referees ruling will be on a booth review of a questionable call. Brett is more inclined than not to watch a game whenever it is on, even if you are not there to watch it with him. Brett is at level 0; he has made a commitment and is sticking with it. He gets excited over a good play (but maybe not enough to strip off his shirt and paint his chest with team colors.)

Now, Brett is following the draft. During his lunch break, he’s looking for opportunities to talk about football with others. When visiting another town on a Sunday, Brett forces his family to take a detour and stop at a sports bar so he can watch his favorite team. He is sold out; nobody would silently wonder, “Is Brett a football follower?” He wears his quarterback’s jersey frequently; because of his speech and conduct everyone who just glimpses at him can tell that Brett is an avid fan. Brett is somewhere on the positive scale, around a +3 I would guess.

What are other ways Brett could become more committed? Get the NFL sports package on Dish Network, participate in a fantasy league, or maybe even get involved by volunteering and even coaching a community league or high school team. These sorts of things will continue moving that number incrementally higher on that scale.

Regarding a person’s Christianity, the analogy holds true. A person (but not most Americans, in our supposedly Christian nation,) starts out knowing nothing of Christ. We are perfectly lost at –7 with no knowledge and the curse of “original sin,” (that natural tendency to commit sinful acts that alienate us from God and an innate desire to drift away from God as we gravitate towards our own selfish ambition.) At a –6 we know a little bit about Jesus and at –1 we have heard the gospel message and are close to accepting the truth. Salvation is at point zero, the balance is tipping.

Ironically, it should be noted that powerhouse atheists such as Richard Dawkins are also living at that same tipping point. Possessing a great deal of “head-knowledge” about God, they are just a decimal of a few thousandths of a place on the negative side of 0. But they have hard hearts that refuse to make any more progress. Ultimately, the believer is a guide to that person on his journey of belief. We cannot force Brett to move any closer to 0; only he can do that with us showing the way and encouraging.

Evangelism methods of the past typically geared everything towards that 0 intersection. I honestly believe that the power of the cross is absolutely necessary and vital, but we cannot overwhelm people before they are ready. We cannot, only minutes after telling him about football, start talking about coaching techniques or offensive formations or linebacker blitzing patterns. They don’t even know that the ball is oblong at this point or the scoring system. We need to keep in mind that this is a progressive issue. Some people might want to hear about the coaching earlier than others, and some converts are ready before others to hear about the Romans Road, 4 Spiritual Points, the Sinners Prayer, etc.

Previous methods that Christians employed to witness to their peers included events like music concerts or gatherings. In these settings, they usually sought to exclude everything worldly (no secular music or music styles… we all know how that devil beat will corrupt any good message and prevent a Christian message from being heard) and everything we did centered on suddenly jerking that –5 level nonbeliever all the way to 0. We make emotional appeals, manipulate, and scare them, whatever it takes to put another notch on our Jesus belt. Often, though, the convert is resentful or has a hard time coping with their decision because they were led to believe (because one drawback of that old technique is that it alludes to this,) that just making that decision to jump to 0, to pray the sinner’s prayer, will suddenly make all their problems disappear.

In my world, evangelism simply means moving a person’s commitment on that scale any increment closer to the positive side. It may be a small move, but it’s a step in the right direction. An event may feature no alter call, there might not even be Christian music or a Christian theme; it may be just a couple of guys hanging out and the nonbeliever gets a hint through body language, conversation or even just temperament that his Christian friends’ faith is relevant. That, to me, is a successful evangelism event.

As Christians we need to reflect on this in terms that we can also relate to. We need to understand this concept of relationship evangelism. It is effective; nearly everybody that receives Christ did so because a friend led him or her to the Lord—that relationship came first. Evangelists account for the minority of salvations… their track record for discipleship/retention is also much worse than that of a person with a relationship foundation.

Do the eternal lives of others mean so little to us that we are willing to adamantly stand by a mode that statistics prove less effective than it’s contemporary counterpart? Are we that unwilling to reach out to our world by building bridges. In college missions work, a Chi Alpha slogan asks us “Do you have room for one more friend?” I don’t think anyone can say that there is no more room.

Think about this. We unload our brains upon the uneducated, pour out all the football knowledge that we know, give them the reasons to get involved and make that sport a part of their life. How successful is that to someone who’s never seen a real game? That knowledge means very little to a person who has never sat on the sidelines and never heard the roar of the crowd nor felt the joy of the game. Get involved.


And now for something completely different... theYP!



a new worship song for this month:
Your Plan

Politeness vs. Necessity

you can get the video version of this blog here:
http://www.tangle.com/view_video.php?viewkey=2dde2db9d420d4668531





When did being a Christian mean that you have to be a nice guy all the time? I understand the importance of love (I’ve been speaking about love a lot lately,) and because people hear me talk about it all the time, they just have to ask me the big question: “Pastor Chris, why are you such a jerk, then?”

If that’s the case, I apologize. You all remember Jim Varney’s character Ernest P. Worell? Like he used to do a skit about, sometimes I too don’t always know when to quit. Humor is pretty subjective and sometimes things don’t always come out as funny as intended. Also, as I’ve often said in the past, some people have purposely executed their sense of humor (for some reason, a portion of the Church believes comedy is sinful—I believe Jesus will put that part back into em when they get a glorified body.) Sometimes, we need to give correction or be honest, and in those cases, many people view criticism as an attack.

When people fall under criticism, they have been taught by our egocentric culture to view that as an attack; our post-modern culture (the idea of moral relativism, i.e. there is no absolute truth) has taught them to immediately suspect anyone offering correction and see them as a type of bully. I think that we can trace much of this back to the advent of the participation ribbon.

No longer does winning mean anything in America. There is no such thing as a winner or loser, only a group of competitors who feel good about themselves. I remember when this thing all started: I was in an elementary wrestling program. I wasn’t terrible, but I wasn’t very good at it either. I remember leaving one such competition with a big ribbon that looked suspiciously like a 1st place ribbon and driving home with my dad, riding in his big pickup. I wanted to throw that stupid thing out the window; I knew that the participation ribbon was supposed to make everyone feel like a winner, but it seemed to mock me for not being good enough, like a red badge of courage that reminded me of my failure on the mat. I still have it; that ribbon is one of the worst memories I have of my collective sports experiences.

Here’s the rub, when people participate in something, regardless of that what that pursuit is, they always seem to think that they excel at it. You know it’s true. Watch the first few episodes of any American Idol season and you will see contestants who think that they are amazing despite causing hearing loss and oratory bleeding in their audience. We have been so focused on self esteem these last few decades that we have a whole generation of people who have zero skills (but think they do) yet feel great about themselves. As one of my youth group kids would say, “they pretty much suck at life.” It’s the truth, and this generation is starting to come out of college now (which has been dumbed down since the bell curve has flattened) and real life smacks em in the face. They can’t hardly believe employers aren’t lining up to hire them with six or seven digit salary packages.

I have discovered that people don’t really want to know the truth; they love the comfortable lie. Folks would rather hear anything other than the truth. Generally, when people ask for advice, they don’t want to hear what you think—they want you to validate them, reinforce what they already believe. This is especially true when it comes to artists, as I’ve come to see as a writer involved in various projects with others.

In one such project, I was working with a visual artist who showed me his sketchbook. He had gotten me really excited about working with him and I’d gotten pretty pumped with my creative juices flowing… but everything inside his sketchbook was sub par work. The situation eventually got volatile (mainly because the artist flipped out on me, even threatening my families lives—he’d lost his grip on reality) so I never had to come to that impasse and tell him that his work wasn’t up to par.

So what do you do when that particularly rotund gal asks you, “Does this make me look fat?” Nobody wants to break the bad news to someone; nobody wants to be a dream killer. We do have an obligation to speak the truth with love, but sometimes situations get so delicate that we can’t help hurt someone. Proverbs 27:5 says “Better is open rebuke than love that is concealed.”

We need to be honest and forthright with people, even it means killing a few dreams along the way. If it was my goal and dream to be a premiere sculpture artist, chiseling marble down into shapes, but wasn’t any good, that would be noticeable. If my friends and family told me how good my misshapen, cracked, and mangled stone figures were, I’d begin to delude myself and never perfect my craft. Excellence would always elude me; that doesn’t do me any favors. Say I had a real skill will working with children or animals, that skill might never get developed since I am spending my time working with stone in a craft that I will never rise to prominence in.

Self-esteem has become so all-important that it is on the verge of trumping even the law. For a while, some school curriculum has placed a higher value on making students feel good than teaching right or wrong, a tricky issue when it comes to mathematics; two plus two is whatever you feel it should be since there is no wrong answer. In the political realm, President Obama will give a lifetime Supreme Court justice appointment. He made it clear that he will appoint someone who can relate to the feelings of the common man. The line is being skirted here; the emotions of charged criminals are going to be given greater weight than the law of the land. We’ve already killed moral truth; lawful justice is in the crosshairs; we can thank the self-esteem junkies and emotional psychology gurus of the past for this next step towards total anarchy.

Of course, we do live in the real world, too. I am not giving carte blanche to act like a jerk; I am merely stating that we need to get better at doing this truth thing. If we can’t get a handle on this, I don’t see how we can ever conquer the idea of moral relativism. And conquering that beast is perhaps the most important thing that the church can accomplish in this generation… before all hope is lost.

This Month's Worship song:


and now for something completley different... theYP!



you can get the video version of this blog here:
http://www.tangle.com/view_video.php?viewkey=2dde2db9d420d4668531

I Love Owning Slaves?

So I was listening to some prominent Christian activists speaking today and I thought it a shame that we even have to use a caveat for our speech. I’ve played this broken record before, I know, but liberals are so quick to attack and have a habit of going about it the same way (because it’s so effective… ironically, they twist what is good, which is how Satan operates.) The speaker said “I love our country; I love America’s history and heritage.”

I don’t know when it happened, but making that statement has become politically dangerous. The speaker had to backup and clarify saying, “Please understand that I know it has had some dark days in the past, but I’m not talking about those, I don’t love those specific things.” I understand why he said it, but am ashamed that he had to. I’ve seen people verbally attacked saying that we love slavery and McCarthyism and racist acts and hate Europe, Mexico, and the ability for anyone but white males to vote. It’s idiotic, but somewhere along the way, we lost the ability to express general love for our country.

For so long, Liberals have enjoyed twisting our vernacular and redefining our terms. Recently, Pro-Life has become a term to actually describe pro-abortion and Pro-Family has come to mean (in some circles) that one is in favor of homosexuals marrying. How long can this wreck of ambiguity continue? As long as people remain idiotic, is my opinion. Redefining the terms is a common argument to try tricking people and eventually winning a debate or argument, it’s been going on a long time (with the obvious example being the disparity between the parties of Pro-Choice and Pro-Life; those terms are not equal in measure and weight. Equal terms would be Pro-Life and Pro-Death, but liberal spin-doctors twisted their definition to be known as Pro-Choice because Death is such a dirty word.)

That speaker got me thinking, ya know, I love America’s slave trading days. Yeah, I know. Here come the mobs with pitchforks and torches. Here’s the thing, America is in dire straits; before long, we may very well cease to exist (or at least I might, personally, as of yesterday my views on the validity of the Christian religion, the Word of God, the direction of our politics, and my general worldview have all firmly placed a label of “possible domestic terrorist” upon me. That’s right, I’m about launch an all-out prayer assault on you and there is nothing more terrifying than being a sinner in the hands of an angry God.) So if America is gone, dead, can we love it then? My thoughts were of my children; if one of them died it would be tragic and I would give almost anything to relive some of life’s moments with them. I would even take one of those “dark days.” If my beloved were gone, even the worst of times would be a blessing to be relived retrospectively.

My fear is that this could be exactly the path we are headed for. Clean up your words; be specific and speak with wisdom, knowledge, and authority. And Lord, send us a Jeremiah!

Love and Underwear

Love and Underwear

Remember Growing Pains? I can’t think of anyone in their mid-twenties to mid-thirties that doesn’t get the instant mental picture of Alan Thick and Kirk Cameron (or maybe Leonardo DiCaprio if you tuned in for those last couple seasons). How about Mike Seever’s best friend, Boner?

Boner was quite the character. While surfing Youtube recently I came across a Mr. Bean excerpt that reminded me of Boner. Someone accidentally swapped pants with Bean in the locker room and so the quasi-mute comic figure went in search of his missing trousers only to find them around the ankles of a man sitting in the WC (he recognized them because his name was written on the tag,) of course, hilarity ensued. The first time Mike Sever and Boner met I recall a joke about Boner’s real name being Dickie so that his mother wouldn’t have to sew his name onto all his underwear.

Yeah, underwear is funny. It’s something that most all of us wear, something that we put on. As a Christian, what else are we supposed to put on? We could run all through the armor of God, but I’m still stuck on underwear and the label aspect. For those two (Boner and Mr. Bean,) those labels where who they were known by; the curious could always check the tag to see just who this person was (that is, if you’re the sort of person to give a wedgie rather than just ask).

In the Bible, John was known as the disciple who Jesus loved. Coincidently, his Gospel has many passages discussing that topic. John 13:35 says (and this is Jesus speaking) “By this all men will know you are my disciples: that you have love for one another.” We are commanded to wear an outward sign of our allegiance to our savior. You instantly recognize a Muslim woman by her burquah, or a Jewish man by his yarmulke; Christians are directed to put on a garment of love that will be visible to the world.

I was discussing this topic with one of my youth/teen leaders as we drove for hours on end through the flooded out areas of North Dakota to visit a college (my Alma Mater: Trinity Bible College.) He told me a story that blew my mind and demonstrates this love in action. The previous youth pastor from a few years back had a pie auction fundraiser for a Speed the Light missions program. There were two pies that were being auctioned with the express purpose of being smashed into the youth pastor and senior pastors’ faces. Of course, those pies were the hot bidding item. The Youth pastor got pied and it was all in good humor. For Pastor Kyle, my senior pastor, the winning bid was over $200. The winner walked up with his pie, set it on the ground, and returned to his seat. “I paid for it and I can do whatever I want with it.” That blew me away (especially since I’m not really used to seeing acts of love exhibited within the church… I really love this church I am a part of, btw.)

Last night I concluded a three-week series covering 1 Corinthians 13. I’ve been focusing on this topic because I believe it’s pivotal that we, as the Body of Christ, make this the theme of our lives. It’s so important that we couch everything in love (as much as humanly possible).

The list in 1 Corinthians 13 gives us an explicit definition of love. In speaking to my group, I showed them a clip from Disney’s Sleeping Beauty. Maleficent has Prince Philip in chains and mocking him she makes a quote that could sum up most Disney movies (although she uses it mockingly,) “True love conquers all!”

Love is our trump; in the game Hearts, the heart (a symbol for love) always wins the hand. Ironically, you can write one of the characteristics of love from 1 Corinthians 13 on each of the heart cards in a standard deck, ending with “Love Never Fails” over the ace. That’s a great reminder for a gamer like me.

Love is the ultimate victor. Scripture tells us that God is love. So how true that statement really is! John 15:13 says “There is no greater love than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”

Christ laid down his life for us, something we are reminded of this Easter season. Jesus was all-powerful; he could have chosen to come down off of Calvary at any time, but he chose love: to lay it all down on our behalf. Such a feat demands a reaction. When someone says, “I love you,” what is your response? How, then do you react to Christ’s ultimate act of love?


and now for something completely different... theYP!




April's Worship Song:
Make Me New

I cheated this month. Make Me New is not original to me, but is one of my favorites and is not well known at all.

Rorschach’s Journal

So, I recently went to se The Watchmen. As I die-hard comic book nerd, I felt it was my duty to see it, despite not reading the comic line in the past; the preview did really pull a heartstring, however, and so choosing to check the flick out wasn’t a hard decision, especially when the alternative was holding my wife’s purse while she hit the weekend JC Penny’s sale.

I’d heard some mixed reviews about the story because of its well-deserved R rating and graphic nature. The cinematography does a pretty good job of drawing the viewer in and setting up the stage, actually making it easy to overlook the harsh “sin-cityesque” nature of the world portrayed in Watchmen. The quasi-dystopian cold-war era alternate reality almost hits too close to home, and as a Christian, there were several things that I “liked” about the movie. I’m gonna dive in and give a review from a Christian standpoint. If you follow my Holy Schmitz! blog, what I am writing this for, you may be familiar with my belief in reaching out to the world on their own terms, on their own ground, to present nuggets of truth to them that are relevant and revealing moreso to them than to us.

As a caveat that I must give, the movie does include graphic violence and gore, nudity, and foul language. As another caveat, the movie is honest and thought provoking and accurately portrays humanity as wicked and depraved creatures. I don’t plan to outline the movie and summarize it, nor give spoiler warnings. I assume that you know about the film or won’t mind (after all-the basic storyline this movie was written around was released as a comic back in the eighties.) I don’t endorse the types of behaviors and overt worldliness portrayed in the film, I just want that clear. I’m not recommending to anybody that they see it, but if you are already inclined to watch it, here are some things that leapt out to me.

The figure that seems to come to the forefront is the sociopath vigilante hero named Rorschach. That is what everyone else calls him, anyway, a sociopath. There is no doubt, as the backstory unfolds that he is disturbed and has some mental issues, but who doesn’t. It’s important to note, also, that there is only one character in the movie that has any true “superpowers.” Everyone else is basically a vigilante leaning either towards a Batman complex or the Punisher.

Through the film, the cinematography lends towards seeing things often through Dr. Manhattan’s eyes. He has become godlike in his abilities and can do almost anything, and he has lost his humanity. While he still works for good, he is so detached from humanity that he no longer sees things in terms of right and wrong or sees people as having much value—we are all just pawns in a system…that is until he has an epiphany later in the film. The characters, as well as the tone of the movie, often asks serious questions about God and whether or not he exists and cares. Manhattan makes a comment to Silk Specter that him producing a miracle to save the planet from nuclear annihilation would be pointless, because miracles by their definition don’t really have any meaning. Through his romantic relationship with her over the years he has learned many things and one of them is how unlikely the chances are of certain events. When Manhattan reaches into her mind near the end of the film, he discovers that she is basically a miracle… the chances of her being conceived and born and taking the path that she walked through her life. This convinces Manhattan to intervene in the end and ties all of the storylines together despite the Quentin Tarantino-like story arc.

Back to Rorschach. Rorschach is violent and murderous, but with just cause. I found myself glued to his story. He sees things in terms of black and white. Rorschach has an epiphany birthed in rage as he tracks down a pedophile that has kidnapped a little girl. He discovers the girl’s panties in the incinerator and finds she has been chopped up and fed to the man’s dogs (the pedophile has a cabinet full of torture devices and meat cleavers). Rorschach had (like Batman) always left judgment up to the legal system up until this point. The pedophile denies it at first and then confesses to Rorschach, telling him that there’s nothing that can be done, he’s sick and needs help. Rorschach realizes at this point, that justice is no longer being done. It, too, has been so corrupted and something needs to be done—someone must stand up for what is moral and right and put the fear of punishment into the hearts of those that are evil. For a really great snippet of the inner workings of Rorschach’s mind and how he views the world (and quit accurately so, in my opinion) check out this youtube clip from the director of the film: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEpz3h9Pr0Q (it’s a pretty powerful monologue Rorschach gives here about the type of people our world is filled with.)

Rorschach is jaded, true. He is a double standard in some ways, but he strives to live a life without compromise. The son of a prostitute and product of a hard-knock life, he is virtually impervious to temptation. He is relentless in his moral mission and almost inhuman, now (although his humanity is touched on during his verbal exchange with Nightowl, his only “friend,” after Rorschach’s escape from prison.) Rorschach claims to his therapist that his humanity died on the day he murdered that pedophile; now, only Rorschach remains.

In the end of the film, when the grand joke is discovered (the intricate plot of a madman trying to reengineer the fate of mankind for their own good) Rorschach is still himself and refuses to bend—something must be done about him. The other heroes realize that they most throw in their lot with the madman, and the viewer does as well. The film does a great job of detaching the viewer from the personal issues of the public and forcing one to look at the big picture: that most of our population is composed of pawns in some planetwide game of powerful players.

The villain essentially frames Manhattan for obliterating New York City and killing millions. He shows the heroes who have cornered him in his secret Antarctic lair, that he did it for a greater good. Millions were murdered to prevent the death of billions with the cold war on the cusp of going nuclear. Everyone reluctantly agrees that the plan must remain intact. The main focus suddenly shifts to sacrifice. Dr. Manhattan, once looked to as the planets greatest hope has been vilified, he must be sacrificed for the greater good. Manhattan agrees (after all-he is so detached from his own humanity that he is willing to be sacrificed—though indestructible, he will simply roam the galaxy, which was already his inclination anyway.) Rorschach, however, refuses.

He reiterates that he cannot live a life of compromise. He will tell the world because he cannot keep this secret and be a part of this, if he does, he becomes a hypocrite and destroys everything he stands for—basically condemning himself by his own judgment. Rorschach begins to leave, saying that he will tell the world, basically challenging his friends to kill him. Again, another must be sacrificed for this global peace to foment as the planet rallies against Manhattan. This is a sacrifice he is willing to give, though. He knows the value of world peace, but cannot tolerate the self-condemnation for which he would undergo. The rest of the heroes remain inside as Rorschach storms outside into the snow, only to find Manhattan already there.

Dr. Manhattan knows what he must do. Rorschach takes off his mask--none of the other heroes had seen his face before (not that we are aware of), and he looks into Manhattan’s eyes yelling at him to do it. Manhattan has a rare moment of emotion and ultimately kills his comrade.

There are several issues that come to the forefront of practical Christian theology, the condition of man, our own self-indulgent inclination to destroy ourselves, and a heroes’ sacrifice are the most prevalent ones. There is a powerful theme in the movie, that all of this evil in existence is not the fault of God. The movie itself is agnostic, unsure if there is a God, but if there is, the condition of our hearts and the condition of humanity is our fault and not his. Here is one such quote, “It is not God who kills the children. Not fate that butchers them or destiny that feeds them to the dogs. It's us. Only us.”

All in all, it was a powerful piece, and while I don’t exactly endorse or ratify the film, if you happen to see it and take some time to digest the story (I saw it a few days ago, actually) you will have one more tool in your chest with which to relate to a lost world that desperately seeks after the light.

The Gospel of Dungeons & Dragons (tm)

The Bible according to Dungeons & Dragons (tm)

I’ve mentioned in previous blogs that I had a professor in college who always said, “Eat the meat and spit out bones,” in regard to mandatory reading in her psychology coursework. That’s a philosophy that I always innately believed, but she said it so often, that it ingrained her phraseology over my beliefs, giving them a convenient label. She had recognized that there were a great many problems in modern psychology that contradict Biblical scripture, but there were also stark nuggets of truth to be found within the core of the subject material.

Using this mentality, I think we as Christians can find a vast amount of common ground with which to relate to the unchurched and build solid relationships with our fellow man. We need to be effective miners, so to speak. When you mine for some precious stone or mineral, you don’t only put whatever materials that you are mining into your cart, you put the whole chunk of stone or dirt in and, when full, take it all out later to carefully sift; this is a process that sees the most amount of true material pulled out (the gems or metals) and the rest of the debris discarded.

As a body of believers in America, we have often dismissed the mine entirely because it’s so dirty and dark inside. Yes, there may be something of value hidden there, but we already have a stockpile of it outside (I’m talking about the Bible, of course). There are, however, the other miners to consider, the people in search of the treasure that they’ve not yet laid a hold of. We need to not grow weary of laboring for their sakes.

By this metaphor, I’m talking about those areas of our culture that we’ve given over to the enemy to do with as he will. Many Christians have surrendered ground in so many areas such as politics, professional sports, specific hobbies genres such as science fiction and fantasy. I have been to many book signings promoting my own novel and interested people with the premise and the goal of my writings, but then they discover it’s a fantasy novel and they give it back, disinterested, shocked, and even offended. I’ve been told, “Oh, we can’t do fantasy,” spoken in a tone of heavy-handed disgust.

So many people have bought into hype movements over the past few years and thrown the baby out with the bathwater when it comes to that particular (fantasy) genre. It has become viewed as unreachable (or at the very least, not worth redeeming.) People forget that the genre was largely defined by Christian authors (such as Lewis, Tolkien, Eddison, Milton.) In fact, many of the oldest literary works in archeology were “Christian Fantasy” possibly including Beowulf (although there is debate there) and including The Song of Roland. The first “contemporary” Christian Fantasy work, without a doubt, is Bunyan’s allegory and everyman story, Pilgrim’s Progress. This is a genre pioneered and utilized by and for the body of Christ for so many years before the Dungeon’s & Dragon’s scare of the early 1980s. For more on that, I encourage folks to read an interesting article by Christian author M. J. Young that I have copied to my writing website: http://www.freewebs.com/thekakosrealm/dndbackup.htm. I don’t feel the need to reiterate all that he says in my blog, although I think there is so much more information that could be discussed that he never covers (author Michael Stackpole also has some interesting research into this area that he’s discussed in public forums), but digging into the late 70’s and early 80’s reveals that most of the publications and organizations that put out materials demonizing D&D (and all role-playing in particular) were the products of very few people who created a media hype enough to make Barack Obama jealous.

I encourage you all to do a little research and to hear me when I say that I do not endorse the game, I do not play the game, and I don’t claim there are not problems with it (but I’d rather see a kid play D&D than Grand Theft Auto). I’m not writing to endorse the game, rather to encourage fellow believers to not wholly and so readily discount entire factions of people, whole subcultures of our country. We would be better served to find a way to turn those people to God, rather than judge them and set them firmly against Him through our attitude and actions.

Back to the heart of the matter: what truth can there be in this game system devised to give players the ultimate adventure, a mirror of real life with only an imagination to limit the players? Plenty, I’d say. The game intends to let players explore and go about their life in an alternate world, contained within the mind of the players and game master. Opponents have labeled (and correctly so) that it is a world that is usually pantheistic, sometimes shamanistic, usually humanistic, and frequently violent. Each of those descriptions, however, can be used to describe typical life in America, even in our public school systems. The element of truth I want to focus on, however, is very specific: the issue of alignment.

Alignment is one of the basic mechanics of the game that defines your character. If you were to begin playing a game for the first time, you would need to create a character to play with. Very early in that process, you would need to pick your alignment. Alignment is composed of two parts, each with three choices. You must decide if you are Lawful, Neutral, or Chaotic. Those attributes describe how your character will approach its environment. Does he/she pursue justice or do they care at all; if they were chaotic, they would try and wreak as much havoc as possible as they act (or at the very base of things have the attitude that everything needs to change—a “down with The Man” attitude).

Choosing if you pursue evil or good is next (with the choice to be neutral usually discouraged by the person running the game. True neutral/neutral characters have been said to be the hardest to play.) One thing to keep in mind, of course, is that evil characters are usually brought to justice. While neutral characters or game characters controlled by the game/dungeon master (called NPCs or non-player characters) usually let good players perform acts of goodness, they usually retaliate or attempt prevention of evil actions.

I believe that the issue of true neutrality within the game is an accurate mirror of reality. It is so difficult to accurately live a true neutral/neutral life (whether in a game or in your personal life) that it is impossible. All evidence, even the Bible, would corroborate that.

True neutral would have to most closely resemble the Buddhist attitude—sit on a rock and don’t interfere or infringe upon the choices or acts of others. You really cannot act, live and let live, because even the smallest action can have far reaching consequences for one side or the other (a butterfly flaps his wings in California and causes a tsunami in Asia). In biblical terms, a person might try and say there are three choices for whom to live for: God, Satan, or self, but scripture is clear that a choice for self is the same as siding with the enemy. There are two parties: those living for God and those aligned against God.

You cannot remain neutral. Edmund Burke (often said to be the founder of political conservatism) said, “All it takes for evil to prevail is for good men to do nothing.” This is the truth; evil is a force, with its own goals, an army trying to advance. The Bible says’ “I will build my church and the gates of Hell will not prevail against it.” This is a call to be active. Jesus said this to Peter, but Christ is no longer on the planet with his carpenter’s tools erecting new buildings—he has commissioned us to spread the gospel—we are called to advance the kingdom of God, called to action.

And act we must. I believe that we must use whatever skills God has gifted us with to reach into all aspects of our population, all subcultures, all groups. This includes not just the sci-fi nerds and gamer fanatics, but misguided homosexual groups, college campuses, interracial social circles, diverse music clubs. God desires ALL of his children to come into fellowship with him, not just the ones we are comfortable with. I was asked to leave one pastorate I was in because it was growing with the wrong sort of people. Those same people also had a problem with my fantasy novel, then in its early stages, claiming that I was actively involved in Satanism because of the book’s genre. We parted under unpleasant circumstances.

My book was written with a specific subculture in mind. The Kakos Realm: Grinden Proselyte is a fantasy story themed around redemption and purpose: finding life and meaning in Christ, and it doesn’t pull any punches about the subject—it’s not written from an allegorical perspective. I wrote it with half a dozen people specifically in mind; one of them died before I was ever able to finish it--now eternally beyond any evangelistic attempts. The book is really my attempt at outreach to the gamer crowd, the D&D junkies who resented the judgmental attitudes and hypocrisy of the Christians they knew. Truly this book was meant to find them on their own terms and not so offend them that they’d discount the religious content of the story. I wrote it so that my faith, through the talents God has given me, could become active and effective.

How are you aligned, are you merely a lawful/neutral? You cannot sit on the fence; there is no middle ground. James 4:4 says that friendship with the world is to be God’s enemy. This verse speaks harshly about those who try to ride the fence, calling them adulterers. There are only two sides in this alignment issue, good and evil. You can only be on the middle for a short period, tottering until you fall one way or the other.


March Original Worship Song

God, You Are

and now for something completely different, theYP:



Hey, share me! pass this blog on. And here is a link for the video version of this month's main entry:
http://www.tangle.com/view_video.php?viewkey=589cd4cbffab41c1f2ee