No matter how you voted or will vote I invite you to read, digest, and implement the following confession of faith drawn up by many evangelical leaders to guide our way through this election and into the future. I included the website where you can find helpful resources and the signers of this confession…so far.

Skye Jethani is the original author, along with twenty other evangelicals. It’s been signed by hundreds of pastors and church leaders, including yours truly. Here are the actual words to the confession.

Our Confession of Evangelical Conviction

In this moment of social conflict and political division, we confess the following Christian convictions:

ONE: We give our allegiance to Jesus Christ alone.

We affirm that Jesus Christ is God’s Son and the only head of the Church (Colossians 1:18). No political ideology or earthly authority can claim the authority that belongs to Christ (Philippians 2:9-11). We reaffirm our dedication to his Gospel which stands apart from any partisan agenda. God is clear that he will not share his glory with any other (Isaiah 42:8). Our worship belongs to him alone (Exodus 20:3-4), because our true hope is not in any party, leader, movement, or nation, but in the promise of Christ’s return when he will renew the world and reign over all things (1 Corinthians 15:24-28).

We reject the false teaching that anyone other than Jesus Christ has been anointed by God as our Savior, or that a Christian’s loyalty should belong to any political party. We reject any message that promotes devotion to a human leader or that wraps divine worship around partisanship.

TWO: We will lead with love not fear.

We affirm that God’s saving power revealed in Jesus is motived by his love for the world and not anger (John 3:16). Because God has lavished his love upon us, we can love others (1 John 4:19). We acknowledge that this world is full of injustice and pain, but we are not afraid because Jesus Christ has promised to never abandon us (John 16:33). Unlike the false security promised by political idolatry and its messengers, the perfect love of God drives away all fear (1 John 4:18). Therefore, we do not employ fear, anger, or terror as we engage in our mission, but instead we follow the more excellent way of Jesus which is love (1 Corinthians 12:31-13:13).

We reject the stoking of fears and the use of threats as an illegitimate form of godly motivation, and we repudiate the use of violence to achieve political goals as incongruent with the way of Christ.

THREE: We submit to the truth of Scripture.

We affirm that the Bible is the inspired Word of God, authoritative for faith and practice (2 Timothy 3:16-17). We commit to interpreting and applying Scripture faithfully, guided by the Holy Spirit, for the building up of Christ’s people and the blessing of his world (John 16:13). We believe any true word of prophecy must align with the teachings of Scripture and the character of Jesus (1 John 4:1-3). Likewise, to lie about others, including political opponents, is a sin (Exodus 20:16). Therefore, we commit to speaking the truth in love (Ephesians 4:15), knowing deception dishonors God and harms the reputation of his Church.

We reject the misuse of holy Scripture to sanction a single political agenda, provoke hatred, or sow social divisions, and we believe that using God’s name to promote misinformation or lies for personal or political gain is bearing his name in vain (Exodus 20:7).

FOUR: We believe the Gospel heals every worldly division.

We affirm the unity of all believers in Jesus Christ (Galatians 3:28), and that through his sacrificial death on the cross, he has removed the barriers that divide us (Ephesians 2:14-18), making people from every nation, tribe, people, and language into one new family (Revelation 7:9). We are called to be peacemakers (Matthew 5:9), and the counter-cultural unity of the Church is to be a sign to the world of God’s love and power (John 13:35; 17:20-21).

We reject any attempt to divide the Church, which is the Body of Christ, along partisan, ethnic, or national boundaries, and any message that says it is God’s desire for the human family to be perpetually segregated by race, culture, or ethnicity is a rejection of the Gospel.

FIVE: We are committed to the prophetic mission of the Church.

We affirm that Christ’s kingdom is not of this world (John 18:36), therefore the Church necessarily stands apart from earthly political powers so that it may speak prophetically to all people, the society, and governing authorities. The Church has been given a divine mission of reconciliation (2 Corinthians 5:18-21). First, we call everyone to be reconciled to God through the proclamation of the Gospel as we teach people everywhere to copy the way of Jesus (Matthew 28:19-20). Second, we seek to reconcile people to one another by addressing issues of justice, righteousness, and peace (Amos 5:24). We accomplish this by loving our neighbors (Mark 12:31), and by engaging our public life with humility, integrity, and a commitment to the common good as defined by our faith in Christ (Romans 12:18).

We reject both the call for the Church to withdraw from societal issues out of fear of political contamination, as well as any attempt to distort the Church into a mere vehicle of political or social power.

SIX: We value every person as created in God’s image.

We affirm that all people bear God’s image and possess inherent and infinite worth (Genesis 1:27). Jesus bestowed dignity upon those his culture devalued, and he taught us that our love, like God’s, must extend even to our enemies (Matthew 5:43-48). Our faith in Christ, therefore, compels us to act with love and mercy toward all from the very beginning of life to the very end, and honor everyone as an image-bearer of God regardless of age, ability, identity, political beliefs, or affiliations (John 13:34-35). We commit ourselves to advocate for the value of everyone our society harms or ignores.

We reject any messages that employ dehumanizing rhetoric, that attempt to restrict who is worthy of God’s love, or that impose limitations on the command to “love your neighbor” that Christ himself removed.

SEVEN: We recognize godly leaders by their character.

We affirm that the character of both our political and spiritual leaders matter. Within the Church, we seek to follow spiritual leaders those who display evidence of the Holy Spirit—love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23). Jesus warned us to be on guard against false teachers who come as wolves in sheep’s clothing (Matthew 7:15). These voices will tempt us with flattery, bad doctrine, and messages we want to hear (2 Timothy 4:3). They serve the false idols of power, wealth, and strength rather than the true God. Outside the Church, we will evaluate leaders based on their actions and the fruit of their character and not merely their promises or political success (Matthew 7:15-20). When any leader claims to have God’s approval, whether in the Church or in politics, we will not confuse effectiveness for faithfulness, but carefully discern who is truly from God (1 John 4:1).

We reject the lie that a leader’s power, popularity, or political effectiveness is confirmation of God’s favor, or that Christians are permitted to ignore the teachings of Christ to protect themselves with worldly power.

Conclusion

We stand united in our confession of faith in Jesus Christ, resolved to uphold the truth of the Gospel in the face of political pressure and cultural shifts. We commit to being a light in the world (Matthew 5:14-16), and faithful witnesses to the transforming power of Christ’s love. We pray that God’s Spirit will revive our Church and strengthen Christ’s people to be agents of his presence and blessing in this turbulent age.

To him who is able to keep us from stumbling and to present us before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy— to the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all ages, now and forevermore! Amen. (Jude 1:24-25)

Initial Signers

grace and peace,

george

PARADIGM SHIFT

December 6, 2020December 6, 2020 george gaffgaLeave a comment

Some of you may remember this picture. Depending on how you look at it, do you see a young woman, or an old woman? It’s a change in perspective. Same picture, different perspective. That’s what happens in faith. Same God, same Bible, same Lord, but…a different way of encountering the message depending on how we have grown up and what’s been emphasized.

If you have grown up with stern authoritarian figures you may be a controlling person yourself and you may take notice in the Bible of God’s sovereignty and control and gravitate towards passages that emphasize such. But if you tended to be loved and affirmed then you might have a tendency to see the dynamics of a loving God as you focus on certain scriptures. This is a generalization but it’s how many people approach the Bible.

I grew up in a loving family though not affectionately so. I was a first born child among three. I grew up as a controlling person, fun but anxious to please and control. Maybe I controlled situations through humor. But enough psychoanalyzing me. Anyway I eventually became a Calvinist. Yep, a strict view of the God who is sovereign and controlling of every molecule, and a God who won’t tolerate sin. Yes, God gave his Son to die for sin and that initiative by God called for strict obedience and lots of expectations of others.

Eventually stories like the Prodigal Son caught my eye and I discovered I had been like the older son, doing and believing everything rightly. I yearned for the love that the prodigal received and looked for that loving God in the scriptures. And I found that God. Ah, the paradigm shift. Then I started to read books by Brennan Manning and Larry Crabb and others who saw the love. And so I began to absorb all the relevant scriptures about love. Those were the ones that began to stand out to me.

And now I look at people differently, at God and at the Bible differently. And I am now, wait for it, reading about Christian Universalism which is Christ centered, honoring of Biblical authority and focused on the love of God. I have discovered that just maybe there is a way of hope for God’s creation whereby the love of God changes everything. There is a DNA built into the creation that needs to be connected to its source- the God of love. God is love. The eternity is filled with love. Sin is its absence. The absence of God. I don’t want to be absent of God.

One more thing. We have all grown up using different Bibles and thus different translations. And even though I have been to seminary and a pastor for a million years it was only recently that I happened on translations and scholarship that allowed me to see that there are words which when translated a certain way convey a different meaning than I had ever encountered. I like these translations because they fit into the new way I see God’s love. Yep, I am biased towards love and against punishment. Words like hell, gehenna, hades, sheol, and ‘eternal’ have all been written and translated from greek and latin in ways that influence how we believe.

But more of that another time. So let’s get to loving. God knows we need more of these days.

God in our Sufferings

September 8, 2017 george gaffgaLeave a comment

Martin Luther once suggested that the deepest revelation of the character of God is in the weakness, suffering and death on the cross.

This is the exact opposite of where humanity expected to find God. Even today some Christians expect to find God in the success of economics or the victory over such enemies as the leaders of North Korea. Such was the expectation of the people of God in the first century. But it was not to be, at least not with Messiah Jesus.

Two verses stand out to me. One is where Paul tells the early church that most importantly he wants them to know “Christ crucified” 1Corinthians 2:2. And I am thinking of the other place where Paul, in the midst of his own suffering, hears from God, “My grace is sufficient for you. My strength is made perfect in your weakness” 2Corinthians 12:9.

So it got me to thinking. We are looking in all the wrong places for answers to our own suffering, for making sense of our sufferings and even our weaknesses. Christ on the cross is in the sufferings of the world. Look how the prophet writes it, “Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows,” Isaiah 53:4. Stop there. Christ on the cross is literally carrying within himself the sorrows of the world and not only that but also our sins (in the next verse). That whole chapter is filled with the sufferings of the Christ and it’s in those places of weakness that Christ is in most intimate contact with us and we with him.

The prophet even writes at one point that what was seen was a Messiah being despised and rejected, not a victorious King. Even in the book of Revelation when Christ is referred to as the Lion of Judah, John turns and sees not the King of Beasts but rather “a lamb that appeared as though slain” (Revelation 5). This is the Christ who identifies with this suffering world.

And I believe that the Christ who suffered is the Father, Son, and Spirit all uniting with the world in its suffering, even now during these devastating hurricanes and their aftermath. It’s in the pain of the world that our Lord bears with us. We cannot speak of the ‘glory of the Lord’ without the ‘Christ crucified’. Love, the feeling as well as the knowledge, is most manifest in weakness. It’s what unites Christ with us and we with him. Certainly there is love in joy and happiness, and lots of money (just kidding). But look what happened to Christ on the cross as he died. He surrendered his soul, his spirit to his Father. “Father into thy hands I commit my spirit” Luke 23:46. And the Revolution and Restoration of the world began. God working in the rubble of the tragedy of that day in the most loving way our God chooses to work.

The other day I was in what might be called ‘existential despair’. In other words, I was feeling crappy about life, things that were happening or not happening. My wife could tell, probably by the way I walked past her with my head hung down and muttering to myself. Well, the next morning upon awakening I prayed fervently just to surrender to God with the sense that my life was in God’s hands. I got up with a sense of connectedness to God and later got a big hug from my wife and life seemed different, better. C.S. Lewis writes that while God whispers to us in our pleasures, God shouts to us in our pain. I guess that means that we are more open to God’s voice in our sufferings although I think it was Elijah who most clearly heard God through a ‘whisper’. (Elijah was in a dark place in those days.)

It was the quietness on Golgotha that captured the attention of the world, when a ‘slain’ lamb changed our relationship with God. God was in ‘that Christ’ reconciling the world to God’s own being. I am pretty sure that God is reconciling the WHOLE WORLD but blessed are those who know it.

I am not a fan of weakness and sorrow nor is God. Perhaps that’s why Christ takes it into himself, not just once but until there is a new heaven and hearth. He is telling us of his love for us. He could not escape the tragic death of the cross because we cannot escape the sorrows of our own lives.

Pascal once wrote that Jesus would be in agony until the end of the world. That is so that every one of us can know that Jesus won’t rest as long as he is bearing in his own soul, the soul of God, our particular sorrows, sin and sufferings. We are ‘in Christ’ in the most organic and intimate sense.

GRACE IN ATHEISM

July 11, 2017 george gaffga1 Comment

So here’s what I think about atheists. There are folks who say God just doesn’t exist, no way, shape or whatever. They are sometimes adamant that there is no power or authority, influence or being and certainly no entity called God.

So I got to wondering one day. What would or could give someone the idea that there is no god, no being of authority in the universe? Could be that people have been hurt by religion? No, that’s enough to maybe stay away from the church but not to believe in nothing. I suppose believing in nothing is some kind of religion but to my mind IT requires more faith than believing in God. But that’s for another time.

So after some pensiveness I came to at least one conclusion. Authority is one of the main issues contributing to atheism. If you believe there is a God, or even gods, you might draw the conclusion that someone or something has authority over your life. And who enjoys anyone being in control or having some authoritative say in our lives. Notice I switched from you to us because this ‘authority thing’ is a problem for believers as well as unbelievers. In atheists it may be more apparent by their words of rejection concerning God, Jesus or any religious figure.

See, we love to be the only authority in our lives and believe me, that is a poor foundation for living. I mean just take a look at AA to see that one of the first steps is surrendering to a higher power. And that is no easy feat.

But believers can experience profound truth concerning authority from atheism. We too love to be in control of our own lives. Oh, we talk a good game about surrendering to Christ, trusting God and so forth but when the rubber hits the road we discover that the words of Jesus ring empty to our ears when it comes to living the life of faith. So that’s why I call this piece GRACE IN ATHEISM. It’s because we have something to learn about ourselves through others.

You know, if an atheist person wanted to, he or she could search and search to really discover if there is a God. God knows there is enough evidence in nature, in philosophy, in science and in writings like the Bible to be able to uncover this God. But if he or she did, then what? Uh oh. Authority.

Recall something Jesus said. And by the way I cannot fathom why anybody could have a problem with Jesus, the smartest, most loving being to walk this earth. But I digress. No I don’t. I want to say something about Jesus.

At one point Jesus told the people around him, especially the religious leaders (now there’s some folks we could have problems with). He said to them that if anyone chooses to do the will of God that person will find out whether Jesus’ teaching really comes from God or if Jesus simply made it up on his own. (Found in the Gospel of John chapter 7:17)

So right there you have it. From the lips of God’s own son. That son, who by the way, in the Garden of Gethsemane tried to work things out on his own but finally said to his Father, ‘Your will be done’

So my invitation to all, including to myself, is to simply say to God –your will be done. And discover that Jesus is real. There is a huge sigh of relief in surrendering one’s life, imperfect as that life might be. See the authority of God, if we really search, is such that we cannot miss the great love of the God of the universe who from the beginning has had only one desire, to share that love with all of us in the midst of all the crap and our own misdeeds. “God is love” is not some trite slogan but the essence of the ONE who governs this creation.

So, see if we look diligently we can find in atheism some of the same stuff we believers are struggling with. Let’s be honest enough to admit that struggle.

For Skeptics and Believers: What draws me to Christianity

August 3, 2015August 3, 2015 george gaffga2 Comments

At the outset I admit, without being trite, that it’s Jesus who attracts me to the Christian faith. The most attractive quality of Jesus is the way he shows us the character of God that is loving, and forgiving. God, through Jesus, has told me I am loved and God has told that nothing can separate me from God’s love. Not even my own stupidity, negligence or sin. God in Christ pursues me until he brings me back into God’s wonderful embrace. This is for me the essence of Christianity in my being and worked out through my life and the community of faithful believers.

It’s difficult to imagine that Jesus is just an imaginary figure created to satisfy the human need for a god or a crutch in life’s hard times. The character of Jesus is not the sort you would, on your own, invent. I will admit that the church has been guilty over the years of producing a version of Christ that takes the form of power but those powers are hard pressed to find the Jesus they affirm from the scriptures of the New Testament particularly the Gospels.

There we find Jesus, the wisest and most loving teacher who ever lived, instructing his followers to ‘love one another’, to ‘love their enemies and bless those who curse them.’ In Christ we discover a religious master who seeks all who feel lost and left out and find themselves as society’s outcasts. His harshest condemnations are reserved for the proud, the self-confident and judgmental.

Jesus taught his followers to engage the world through ‘weakness’ not ‘strength’. He said they should take up a cross and be willing to die for one another and that behind such ‘foolish’ talk was the love of the Father, God. That kind of teaching goes against the grain of our ego but aligns itself with the Creator. And Jesus not only teaches these principles. He lives them, taking upon him, servant-hood even to the point of death.

I am currently watching all the political posturing of the possible candidates for the office of President and all I witness is self-aggrandizement, judgementalism, pride and power. Maybe I need to look harder and elsewhere.

A skeptical view of Christianity usually addresses the failures of the church, the institutional and individual sins and while it could be made abundantly clear that the church has done more good on this earth than any other institution let’s admit that the church has had its share of failure and sin.

Skepticism does have its place for they wonder if the church didn’t invent this Jesus within the pages of history of the course of the first few centuries C.E. And skeptics do well to question Jesus role today especially in matters of evil, suffering and injustice. These are valid queries into Christianity as long as those asking are willing to do the appropriate searching into the person and work of Jesus. And those of us willing to believe them must be willing to bear a healthy investigation.

To dismiss Christianity because of perceived contradictions in the Bible is not sufficient because most skeptics have seldom read the Bible. And contradictions that might be found are to my mind evidence of the veracity of the witness accounts. Eyewitness accounts rarely find total congruence. We would be even more suspicious if they did.

I think a bigger problem is that Christianity has been around for 2000 years and has been put up on our mental if not physical shelves to be disregarded and a dust collector at best. Many people have simply not tried to place their confidence in everything Jesus did or said. And we are part of a society, which is pretty self-absorbed whereby life, the way we decide to live it, is just fine. THAT would be a religion created in our own image, a religion that we take off the shelf every once in a while, blow the dust off and look for the self-help section.

But not so with Jesus. In every aspect of life Jesus claims Lordship and he calls for our devotion not because he is an egomaniacal dictator but because as God he knows what’s best for his creation.

People say that Christianity is a ‘weak’ religion. I say that dying to self takes more ‘guts’ than to live by any other code. And what is so incredibly reassuring about it is that we don’t have to go it alone.

Grace and Peace