Dig in Deep

In a few days, we will have been living in Gainesville for six months. Like most things in life, the time has passed very quickly – it seriously feels like a week ago that we moved here. Having unpacked boxes and an unsold house doesn’t help that feeling, but even without those things, this time has just blown by.

Life in Gainesville is really pretty great. The kids are in a great charter school – eighteen students per grade, and these teachers are amazing. Life here is generally slower than in the Atlanta suburbs – people actually go the speed limit for the most part, especially in those flashing-yellow-light school zones.  The weather is awesome, though I’m sure I’ll be complaining come summertime.

All of that is like extra icing on the cake, though. What has made this time really amazing is what we’ve been doing with the church here. It’s hard to look back and see a night and day difference from where the community is now versus where it started, but there’s something that has grown among us that none of us would deny.

One of the benefits to how this group has been planted is that with most of us having moved here for this, we have far fewer ties to distract us from community life. While it’s important to be able to guide people out of those distractions and into a focus on the church body, I’m also learning that it is far more important to begin with a group that is absolutely and entirely singularly focused on Christ, and the sense that the church is his physical expression on the earth, and worthy of our full attention. Once you have that established, guiding newcomers into an appropriate focus on community life is far easier to do.

The other thing that has been very sweet is meeting, and being in community with, many different people with similar stories. How they came to Christ, but also how they struggled with the institutional church and how they came to a realization that they would have to leave institutions behind, but also making the decision to leave family and friends behind to pursue it. Nearly everything we’ve felt or had to deal with along the way is mirrored in other people here.

What we’ve found most encouraging, though, is the fierceness and intentionality of sharing a revelation of Christ that is going on here. As I’ve stated before, we’re being planted by leaders for whom this is not a new experience – they understand the necessity of a mind-blowing revelation of Christ, and they know how to share it. We are incredibly blessed to have these leaders among us. While the sacrifices of moving here were – and still are – very great, the blessings that we have experienced have made it worth doing ten times over.

Welcome to the new blog…   derekmooney.com.  Sounds narcissistic, I know, but in reality that’s all anyone’s blog is.  It’s all about me here – or, at least, it’s about whatever I want it to be about.

I moved everything for a few reasons.  First of all, the name showmethemooneys.com was originally imagined as a multi-family site, focusing primarily on my siblings and I, sharing family news, etc.  I probably had that idea a couple of years too soon, because nobody was interested in blogging at the time, and by the time they got interested, I had already taken this blog on as purely mine.  Which is fine.  I’ll resurrect showmethemooneys.com if/when Amy decides to blog (the name was her idea, after all).  The name makes sense as a family update site, which I’ve never really put a lot of effort into that.  In the meantime, all the old links should still work.

The reason I moved the blog now was because Blogger was removing FTP publishing, which I had been using for nearly five years to publish my blog to my own domain.  I didn’t want to move to a blogspot domain, and then move again.  I had already been considering re-purposing this blog a bit, as well as making the jump to WordPress.  I figured that now is as good time as any, and it was actually far easier than I had feared, thanks to the amazing tools and plugins available for WordPress.

As far as shifting the purpose of the blog, I intend to post less frequently about politics.  I haven’t posted much here about politics in the past year mainly because Facebook and Twitter both provide a better way for me to make smaller comments.  I might make longer comments on here from time to time, but it’ll be far less often.  My viewpoint on politics haven’t shifted, but perhaps my priorities have.  If you want to hear my thoughts on politics, Facebook is probably your best bet (www.facebook.com/derekmooney/).

The reason to re-purpose this blog is because I intend to post far more frequently about what’s been happening with us here in Gainesville, Florida, and our experiences with Frank Viola, Milt Rodriguez, and the rest of the amazing people God has led here to be a part of this.  The past six months have been nothing like we expected, and everything we imagined.  I’ll post more about that later on, but for now, suffice it to say that a new purpose for the blog deserved a new name, and a new look.

I even seriously considered cleaning some old posts out, moving them to another archive blog, etc.  I decided against it.  I’m still proud of most of what I’ve written, even if I look back now and see some misguided priorities here and there.  No matter, that’s the story of my life.  In some ways, the blog is as much an archive of my life for others to read down the road, for better or for worse.

A couple of technical things:

• If you’re subscribed via a feedreader, please update your feed settings to pull from feeds.feedburner.com/derekmooney.  The old feed link will work for awhile, but at some point I plan to try to redirect it and eventually shut it down.
• I installed an iPhone plugin, so give it a try.  The wpTouch plugin is really nifty.
• I do plan on updating the theme at some point.  It’s somewhat low on my list of priorities right now.
• I’m going to be working on a blogroll – if you’d like me to add your blog/website to the links section, add me to yours (please link to www.derekmooney.com, with either my name as the title, or “Dig in Deep”), and leave a comment with a link to your blog.

This poem – actually, a hymn written by Watchman Nee – was shared at our church gathering the other night. It spoke volumes to me, and I wanted to share it. (I removed the KJV style from it, except where it would have affected the rhyming.)

You have said You are the Vine, Lord,
And that I’m a branch in Thee,
But I do not know the reason
Why I should so barren be.

Bearing fruit is my deep longing,
More Your life to manifest,
To Your throne to bring more glory,
That Your will may be expressed.

But I fail to understand, Lord,
What it means – “abide in me,”
For the more I seek “abiding,”
More I feel I’m not in Thee.

How I feel I’m not abiding;
Though I pray and strongly will,
Yet from me You seem so distant
And my life is barren still.

Yet You are the Vine, You said it.
And I am a branch in Thee;
When I take You as my Savior,
Then this fact is wrought in me.

Now I’m in You and I need not
Seek into Yourself to come,
For I’m joined to You already,
With Your flesh and bones I’m one.

Not to “go in” is the secret,
But that I’m “already in!”
That I ne’er may leave I’d ask You,
Not how I may get within.

I am in, already in You!
What a place to which I’m brought!
There’s no need for prayer or struggling,
God Himself the work has wrought.

Since I’m in, why ask to enter;
O how ignorant I’ve been!
Now with praise and much rejoicing
For Your Word, I dwell therein.

Now in You I rest completely,
With myself I gladly part;
You are life and You are power,
All in all to me Thou art.

One of the things that is so striking about this song, to me, is how honest it is about struggling to feel like God is present. Which is something most Christians struggle with, if they’re honest with themselves.

But the response is so full of truth, yet in all my life it lacked power – I am already in Christ, and He is already in me. I’ve heard this probably a million times, but I’ve never been able to rest in it. God’s presence has always been a pursuit, whether something I was supposed to attain through Bible study and prayer, or by attending (or creating) a stirring worship experience, or by seeking His presence through intimate worship. All of those approaches miss the point. We are in Him. He is in us. There is no work for us to do to attain it. We can simply rest in Him. When we gather, we are giving expression to that reality. What a blessing!

If you haven’t yet heard the news, it’s big – we’re moving to Gainesville, Florida in August. This comes as a surprise to just about everybody, and as a shock to some, but this is something we strongly feel God is calling us to do.

First, I’ll get the easy stuff out of the way. I am not changing jobs. I’ve been working at home for the past few months again, and I will be working at home from Gainesville, as well. Hearing that, people then ask why we’re moving to Gainesville. I usually give them the “short” answer – there is a church group starting there that we strongly feel called to be a part of. The frequent follow-up question is whether I’m going to be on staff at this church. Let me assure you that nothing could be further from the truth.

God has been pulling us away from institutional Christianity for a few years. If you’ve been reading this blog for awhile, you’ve seen the process somewhat. It started when we began to feel that there was “more” to church than what we were experiencing, and left the church we had been a part of for five years (and the denomination that I had been a part of my entire life).

Part of that process put us into a house church. If you’re interested, you can read a good recap of my journey up to that point. While it was far more relational, and was a step along the journey God had in mind for us, He was also leading us to something far more organic than what we were experiencing there.

What do I mean by organic? There are many ways to describe that. One way to say it is this:

[It is a] church that is born out of spiritual life instead of being constructed by human institutions and held together by religious programs. Organic church life is a grassroots experience that is marked by face-to-face community, every-member functioning, open-participatory meetings (as opposed to pastor-to-pew services), nonhierarchical leadership, and the centrality and supremacy of Jesus Christ as the functional Leader and Head of the gathering. (see “What is an ‘Organic’ church?” at housechurchresource.org)

The other key to an organic church is that of apostolic leadership. This style of leadership functions by providing a glorious revelation of Christ as a foundation, assisting the church in growing into every-member functioning, and watching out for problems that will inevitably arise. Apostolic leadership instructs the church in how to live by divine life, how to experience the fellowship of the divine community, and prepares and equips others for apostolic work. These principles are not based on modern or ancient ideals of leadership, but on the foundation of how Christ trained the apostles and how they trained their successors to spread and express the Kingdom of God.

Many house churches lack a commitment to organic church life. Fewer still have any kind of apostolic leadership or even a desire for one.

One of the problems we have run into is that we feel very isolated when it comes to our view of the church. I don’t want to sound like I’m complaining when I say this, but our efforts to share with others what God has revealed to us has largely fallen on deaf ears. I now realize that this is because we are sharing from a theoretical and intellectual perspective rather than from a perspective based on experience. Basically, we cannot create something that we have not yet experienced.

Which leaves us only one choice: to go somewhere to experience it.

The church group in Gainesville is being started by Frank Viola along with some of his other co-workers. Frank Viola is the author of many books on organic church life, including Reimagining Church and From Eternity to Here, among others, as well as a new book coming out later this year that takes the theology of his existing books and describes more practical examples.

We met Frank personally late last year, and as we were sharing our struggles and thoughts, he invited us to come and be a part of this group in Gainesville, FL. There are several people moving to Gainesville from around the country, some of whom we have already met, who have had experience with organic churches. Some of them have been involved with planting and equipping organic churches around the country.

We initially resisted, not even really taking it seriously. Moving to be a part of a “house church” sounds a little crazy. I also had my jaw surgery and that kept us from really thinking about it much.

But God didn’t leave it alone, and He seemed to close pretty much all the other doors. Nobody we knew was really interested in the kind of thing that God had laid on our hearts. Even the group that would have represented the best fit here wasn’t going to work, for a couple of reasons. And as our interactions with Frank and others increased, and we understood more of what God designed the church to be, we yearned more for an opportunity to experience it.

From a practical perspective, why move? We love this house. We like the area. Our kids were in a great private school. All of our close family is nearby. We have lots of friends in the area. We have a lot of history here. Things are comfortable, and for the most part, things are great.

But staying comfortable is not a reason to resist God’s call.

We are moving to experience the very thing that God has revealed to us and laid on our hearts. It is not something we can initiate without having first experienced it.

Furthermore, we are not starting something new with our peers, trying to figure this out as we go. We are entering into this with mentors, who have done this before, many times, and who understand the glories and riches of a Christ expressed through divine life. We may be losing proximity to family and friends, but we will be gaining spiritual fathers and mothers, who understand our desire for a church free from religion, free from clergy, free from institutionalism, free from denominationalism, free from legalism, free from pentecostalism, free from evangelicalism, free from passivity, free from treating church like a business, and free from anything other than Christ and Him alone.

And as much as we wish we could experience that here, it has become increasingly clear that we will not have that opportunity.

Sometimes it takes great pain to follow God’s call. It was difficult for Israel to leave Egypt. It was difficult for Israel to leave the wilderness and enter into Canaan. It was difficult for Israel to leave the comforts of Babylon and return to rebuild Jerusalem. But God had a destination in mind for them.

He has a destination in mind for all of us, as well, one that would not just turn us from stones into living stones, but to take these living stones and through divine life form a house within which he can dwell.

How long we will be in Gainesville, and where we will go from there, only God knows. We do know, however, that during our time there we will be trained and equipped, prepared for whatever God calls us to do and wherever He calls us to go.

Frank Viola asked many of his readers to do a “blog circuit,” where either we would post a review of his latest book, or we could do our own Q and A with him. Since I already posted my review, here are the questions I asked him:

1) If Eternity is the first book of yours that someone has read, which of your other three books (Untold Story, Pagan Christianity, Reimagining Church) would you recommend they read second?

It all depends. If they were someone who was open to the idea that church as we know isn’t “it,” and they felt that there must be more, I would give them “Reimagining Church” probably. If they didn’t feel that way, I’d give them “The Untold Story of the New Testament Church.”

Untold Story is a book I’m in the middle of now – I’ll review it when I’m finished with it, but it is a retelling of the book of Acts, weaving in details from the other letters in the New Testament along with other historical information. It paints a very clear picture of the founding of the New Testament church, and particularly of Paul’s ministry.

2) How long have the central ideas expressed in Eternity been a clear focus for you? Was it revealed to you through a process of searching, or as a simple moment of discovery?

Both. There was an initial crisis in April of 1992. I had the “general outline” in my mind and heart, you might say. But since then, it’s been an ever-expanding revelation within me, and many details of that outline have been filled in. That still goes on today. The Eternal Purpose cannot be exhausted.

I’m also going to highly recommend listening to Viola’s talk at George Fox Seminary that he gave earlier this year. It’s also available as a podcast on iTunes. I can’t stress enough how much you should listen to this – if you’re not really a book reader, listen to this talk. It does a better job of explaining all of this than I can summarize here.

OTHER BLOGS PARTICIPATING IN THE “FROM ETERNITY TO HERE” BLOG CIRCUIT

Today (June 9th), the following blogs are discussing Frank Viola’s new bestselling book “From Eternity to Here” (David C. Cook, 2009). The book just hit the May CBA Bestseller List. Some are posting Q & A with Frank; others are posting full reviews of the book. To read more reviews and order a copy at a 33% discount, go to Amazon.com:

For more resources, such as downloadable audios, the free Discussion Guide, the Facebook Group page, etc. go to the official website: http://www.FromEternitytoHere.org/

Enjoy the reviews and the Q and A:
—–
Out of Ur – http://blog.christianitytoday.com/outofur/archives/2009/05/viola.html
Shapevine – http://www.Shapevine.com/ (June newsletter)
Brian Eberly – http://www.brianeberly.com/
DashHouse.com – http://www.DashHouse.com/
Greg Boyd – http://www.gregboyd.org/blog/
Vision Advance – http://vision2advance.blogspot.com/
David Flowers – http://ddflowers.wordpress.com
Kingdom Grace – http://kingdomgrace.wordpress.com
Captain’s Blog – http://www.captainestes.blogspot.com/
Christine Sine – http://godspace.wordpress.com
Darin Hufford – The Free Believers Network – http://www.freebelievers.com/
Zoecarnate – http://zoecarnate.wordpress.com/
Church Planting Novice – http://www.churchplantingnovice.wordpress.com/
Staying Focused – http://kimmartinezstayingfocused.wordpress.com/
Take Your Vitamin Z – http://www.takeyourvitaminz.blogspot.com/
Jeff Goins – http://jeffgoins.myadventures.org/
Bunny Trails – http://bunny-trails.blogspot.com/
Matt Cleaver – http://mattcleaver.com/
Jason T. Berggren – http://blog.jasonberggren.com/
Simple Church – http://www.simplechurchjournal.com/
Emerging from Montana – http://wordofmouthministries.blogspot.com/
Parable Life – http://www.theparablelife.blogspot.com/
Oikos Australia – http://www.oikos.org.au/blog/
West Coast Witness – http://www.WestCoastWitness.com/
Keith Giles – http://www.Keith.Giles.com/
Consuming Worship – http://www.consumingworship.org/
Tasha Via – http://www.tashavia.blogspot.com/
Andrew Courtright – http://www.andrewcourtright.blogspot.com/
ShowMeTheMooneys! – http://www.showmethemooneys.com/
Leaving Salem, Blog of Ronnie McBrayer – http://leavingsalem.wordpress.com/
Jason Coker – http://pastoralia.missionaltribe.org/
From Knowledge to Wisdom – http://isthistheway.typepad.com/
Home Brewed Christianity – http://www.homebrewedchristianity.com/
Dispossessed – http://kblog.kevinjbowman.com/
Dandelion Seeds – http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/Dandelionseeds
David Brodsky’s Blog- “Flip the tape Deck” – http://flipthetapedeck.blogspot.com/
Chaordic Journey – http://jeffrhodes.wordpress.com/
Renee Martin – http://www.reneemartinmusic.com/profiles/blog/list
Bob Kuhn – http://organicchurchnola.wordpress.com/
Living with Freaks: http://www.livingwithfreaks.com/
Real Worship – http://therealworshipleader.com/
Fervent Worship – http://ferventworship.blogspot.com/
Julie Ferwerda Blog – http://www.JulieFerwerda.com/ / http://www.OneMillionArrows.com/
What’s With Christina?! – http://w2christina.blogspot.com/
Irreligious Canuck – http://www.irreligiouscanuck.com/
This day on the journey – http://guychmieleski.blogspot.com/
Live and Move: Thoughts on Authentic Christianity – http://liveandmove.blogspot.com/
Spiritual Journey With God – http://www.elvineve.blogspot.com/
Dries Conje – http://www.echurch.co.za/ / http://www.thejesusfeed.com/ / http://www.bookdisciple.com/
Journey with Others – http://journeywithothers.blogspot.com/
On Now to the Third Level – http://www.080808onnowto.blogspot.com/
Christine Moers – http://www.welcometomybrain.net/
Breaking Point – http://marybethstockdale.wordpress.com/
Hand to the Plough – http://www.handtotheplough.com.au/
Jon Reid – http://jonreid.blogs.com/oneanother/welcome-pilgrim.html
Weblight – http://www.blog.worldwidewebservices.se/
D. L. Webster – http://gzmproductions.com/dlwebster
Searching for the Whole-Hearted Life – http://wholeheartedlife.blogspot.com/

Any of you who have been following my blog for awhile know that I’m a big fan of Frank Viola’s books. It started with Rethinking the Wineskin, and continued with Pagan Christianity and the update to Wineskin, Reimagining Church. This certainly continues with his new book, From Eternity to Here: Rediscovering the Ageless Purpose of God.

(Note: While the links are to Amazon, Viola really wants everyone to order from Parable.com or purchase the book at Lifeway as the book is getting started. He explained why he’s requesting that on his blog. Basically, Parable/Lifeway is promoting the book and selling it at a really good price, and the more they sell the more attention they’ll give the books, and the more people will hear this message. You can buy the book from Parable right now for less than $10.)

While Viola’s other books that I’ve read focus on church practice and tradition, this book is different because it focuses on purpose – God’s purpose in all of creation, humanity, and the church. The book is split into three parts, focusing on three “stories” that are interwoven throughout the Old Testament and the New Testament.

The first story is that of God seeking a bride for his Son.

The second story is that of God seeking a dwelling place.

The third story is that of God creating a new species to fully reveal Christ.

While these aspects of scripture aren’t generally new to many Christians, the depth and intensity of them as God’s central purpose is largely lost in modern Christianity. Churches focus primarily on other “things.” These things include evangelism, charismatic gifts, theology, eschatology, etc. These things are not necessarily bad in and of themselves, but the pursuit of them as central obscures from us the reasons why God embarked on this whole creation thing to begin with, as well as why he chose to send his Son and establish the ekklesia on earth.

What Viola’s book does is help us realign our perspectives back onto God’s central purposes. And by doing so, helps us to regain a new focus on Christ as not just the center, but as the fullness.

One of the best chapters of the book is the afterword, “One Man’s Journey Into Deep Ecclesiology.” In it, Viola shares his personal history of going through spiritual “things,” and finding that they do not satisfy. To Viola, “Deep Ecclesiology” leads ultimately to Christ, and to a revelation of Him that changes the entire way we view the ekklesia. The afterword wraps up the information of the book and presents it as a heartfelt pleading to discover Christ in a new way.

In some ways, this book would be the best book to read first of any of Viola’s books, as it shares his heart and lays a foundation for why we should question historical church practices, and why we should restore New Testament practices – because of how they either interfere with or focus on God’s eternal purposes for the ekklesia. I believe that those who read this book first would feel less threatened by Viola’s other books as they would better understand the heart behind them.

In my last post, I made reference to the fact that God just put something right in front of us that we had been seeking for some time.

To put it simply, we’re making the move into intentional community, and we have invited our good friends Kevin and Faith Blackwell to come and live with us. They are excited about it, and will be moving in this Friday.

When we bought our current home, we were looking for a house that fit a lot of criteria. But two of the things we were looking for was a place that would be ideal for hosting a house church, and a place where we could pursue community in a more direct way. We had two options in that regard. The fourth bedroom in our house is off of the kitchen and has its own private bath. We also have a huge basement that is still mostly unfinished and has lots of windows – there is plenty of space that is ideal for an apartment.

We learned a couple of weeks ago that Kevin and Faith were going to be moving back up this way, and into a less than desirable situation. Amy and I were already making plans to move the kids’ bedrooms around and free up the fourth bedroom. So we brought up the conversation, and Kevin and Faith were very excited about the opportunity. We laid out two options – we could work towards finishing out an apartment where they’d have their own space, or we could have them move into the main level and share the kitchen and living spaces with us.

Without really any question, all of us were in agreement that we wanted to share the space. Our house is really too big for just one family, anyway.

This is really exciting to us for several reasons. First of all, Kevin and Faith are very good friends of ours. I first met Kevin nearly eight years ago, at Faith Community Church, where he stepped up as our main drummer there. We played together there for five years or so, but more than that, we shared a lot in planning, dreaming, and working in ministry.

Kevin and Faith have always been great with our kids, and our kids have always loved Kevin and Faith, as well. For those keeping track, Odie spent some time with Kevin and Faith, too.

There are some practical reasons why sharing a house with others make sense. Sharing groceries, utilities, appliances, etc., makes the cost of living a little less for us all. Sharing the tasks of cooking, cleaning, etc., means less work for any one person overall.

More than that, though, are the spiritual and relational benefits of being more connected in day-to-day life. We have seen, through other members of my family who are doing similar things, the joys and struggles that accompany this kind of living. In marriage, your closeness reveals flaws in your character and is supposed to sharpen you and move your further towards righteousness. We all fully expect to experience each other’s good and bad times, and we feel that we already have the strong friendship in place to help us weather the storms that will come.

We are blessed to know others living this way who can help us navigate the options of how to share groceries, how to handle rent, how to deal with noise, kids, etc. Each situation is different, though, so we have to rely on God to connect us and lead the way. We would appreciate your prayers as we begin this.

Of course, many people simply won’t understand why we would choose to do this. Many assume that it is simply to help some friends out, as a temporary situation – Kevin lost his job at Circuit City, and is looking for a job, by the way. While we would have been willing to help out friends on a short-term basis, that’s not an accurate summary of what this is about. We are setting this up, quite intentionally, to last beyond just the “helping a friend out” stage. I think for many people it is very difficult to understand why we would be willing to give up our “private” spaces and share it with another family. Simply put – I believe God is glorified when we seek to form deeper communities with each other, and deeper commitment to each other. We are also very excited to see how God will shape us through this phase of our lives.

As I shared on this blog a couple of months ago, we recently tried to start hosting a house church in our home. At the time, a previous house church that we were a part of was dissolving because the leader of it was moving away. Amy and I decided that we should try to start hosting one ourselves, and pull from the people who had been a part of that house church as well as try to get others involved who we thought might be interested.

Our previous “house church” was pretty much just that – a church that met in a house. It’s not like there was a “sermon,” but in reality it didn’t move beyond the concept of clergy any more than a traditional church would. Most people called the leader the pastor (though I specifically did not refer to him as such), and looked to him as that kind of a role. He led it more like a bible study/discussion time, so it was in reality more open than a typical church would be. It was a good step for Amy and I when we joined that group, but I felt, over time, more and more God’s leaning to do things differently.

Then the leader of that group moved away, and we were faced with whether or not to try hosting a house church ourselves. But without someone filling the pastor/clergy role, we did not really know if it would stick with a group that had been, for the most part, been passive in gatherings. But we felt called to give it a try. My brother, who leads a fully organic meeting at his house, agreed to help us get started.

In the end, it really came down to not having people who were really interested in doing something different. I’m not upset about it, as I didn’t want to have any regrets about not trying it. We also learned a lot through the process, and will be better prepared next time God calls us to do this – and we are confident that there will be a next time. The main thing we’ve learned is that in order to try hosting an organic meeting, you need to do it with a least a couple of people who totally “get it” and are committed to church gatherings led by the Spirit alone. While my brother was helping us, he and his wife were still hosting their own meeting and I didn’t feel right relying on them for that role indefinitely.

So Amy and I will be doing some exploring and asking God what He would really like for us to be doing right now. We have some schedule concerns with the other house church groups that we’ve been networking with – it’s not easy to do late evenings with young kids, especially when they get up really early for school and get very cranky early in the evening. (That’s one of the reasons we really liked Sunday afternoons.)

There’s also a “traditional” church that I’ve been somewhat connected with over the last couple of years (I’ve led worship there a few times and played guitar/bass a few times also), that we’re considering checking out some of their smaller groups and see how open they are and how their small groups currently function.

So pray for us in this regard. We might not get totally settled until March or so — I’m having a major jaw surgery in January and it’ll be a few weeks before I’m really up for much, anyway. (I’ll post more about that later.) I may have a difficult time compromising my ecclesiology, but I’m willing to do that if God is calling us somewhere and wants to use my restlessness to stir things up there.

The interesting thing is, literally a day after we made this decision God placed something into our laps that our hearts have longed for, something actually a little more extreme than organic house church (in many people’s opinions, anyway). That deserves its own post, so stay tuned.

Yesterday, Obama spoke plainly about his agenda – “spread the wealth around.” Watch it here.

Even just a few years ago, this kind of talk would have been front page news. And it would have been a major turn-off for the majority of voters. Today, though, our public is ready to accept socialism, even if they don’t want to call it such.

Last night my dad sent out an e-mail titled “Wealth Redistribution is Neither Neighborly Nor Christian.” It was a very simple and straightforward comparison of private charity to government redistribution. I’ll let his e-mail speak for itself as a response to Obama’s desire to “spread the wealth around.”

It’s time the prevarication of referring to a progressive tax structure (or other wealth redistribution scheme) as “neighborly” or “Christian” is addressed with some clarity and truth.

Let us assume two families, the Smith family and the Jones family, live in adjacent houses in Anywhere, USA, and are thus literally neighbors. Further, they are on good terms and have a long-standing friendly relationship. Their children play together, they get each other’s mail during vacations, and they exhibit many other typical American neighborly behaviors. We would say, without question, these two families are neighbors.

Now, let’s suppose that the Smith family falls on hard times. Mrs. Smith loses her job due to circumstances beyond her control, and Mr. Smith alone cannot support the family on his elementary school teacher’s salary. Her car has mechanical problems, and they don’t have the money to have it repaired. Fortuitously, the Jones family next door has a third (spare) vehicle.

Of their own free choice, Mr. and Mrs. Jones offer to loan (or give) their extra vehicle to their neighbors, so that Mrs. Smith can seek employment or “whatever you need,” until “things get better.” Note the government isn’t involved in any way. This is an example of true neighborly acts (or acts of Christian kindness), initiated in the hearts of the givers, and which happen all over this nation on a daily basis.

In contrast, suppose the Jones family owns a small business that has proven very successful due to their hard work and endless hours. The government decides to further increase their income taxes “to help the less fortunate,” in keeping with principles of “fairness,” etc. The neighboring Smith family (or others in similar circumstances) may receive some of the money the government takes from the Jones family, by force of law (coercion). There is less money available to help the Smith family and others, after handling costs and paying salaries and expenses of the beaurocrats collecting and managing the money. And the government decides how to spend the money.

In this latter case, it’s unavoidably true that the Jones family has less money available to help others or give to the charities of their choice. Maybe they even have to sell one of their vehicles to pay the extra taxes, so it’s not available to help the Smith family. Secondly, there is no decision in the heart of the Jones family to help others – more likely they resent the government taking even more of their hard-earned income. Third, they may rationalize, “There’s no need for us to help others out; let the government do it.” Finally, there is no human connection between the actual neighbors or others who may benefit from the subsequent government spending. But the central actor is the nameless, faceless “government,” except of course for the politicians who endlessly take credit for proposing the program, or supporting, co-sponsoring, or voting for it (often even when they didn’t). An added benefit to them is that they get to buy votes with someone else’s money (ours).

Who makes the decision makes all the difference. Only individuals can make neighborly or Christian decisions. There is nothing whatsoever that is neighborly or Christian about the government taking from some by force and giving to others. Make no mistake about it, and don’t be misled. The only honest and objective term to describe this behavior by government is socialism.

Moreover, the politicians know it. But they will never say it. So one part of the big lie is that they have to find something else to call it. They also know that neighborly or even Christian principles are core values for most Americans. So another part of the big lie is to mask a heavy graduated income tax, not coincidentally one of the major planks of the Communist Manifesto, in neighborly or Christian terms. Perhaps you can recognize real “lipstick on a pig” when you see it.

The only thing I would add is the difference these two scenarios have in the Smith family.

As recipients of their neighbors’ kindness, they are motivated to improve their situation, because they do not want to be a long-term burden on their friends. They are also touched by the kindness they have received, and are much more likely to help someone else in the future when they see someone else in need.

Compare that to receiving your rightful statutory assistance from the government. They would not feel as if they are imposing on anyone, because after all they are getting what is “rightfully” theirs, by law – they would even be able to sue the government for it if they did not receive it. Because they had never been truly touched by the kindness and generosity of others, they are that much less likely to respond with kindness and generosity in the future when they see someone in need – an extension of the “let the government do it” argument (which is exactly why liberals like Barack Obama and Joe Biden give very, very little to charity).

Socialist wealth redistribution may indeed, temporarily, assist someone economically. But it also results in a moral cancer, increasing our isolation from each other, bitterness, selfishness, and envy of others’ success and accomplishments.

Remember Matthew 6. Those who blow trumpets to call attention to their righteous acts receive all the reward they will ever get here on earth. This would include those who favor socialist acts of wealth redistribution.

The Matthew 25 Network has already revealed itself to be totally pro-Obama, “defending” him based on his statements alone and refusing to consider his record. In any case, they’ve gone and completely discredited themselves, by putting up this site:

http://www.prolifeproobama.com/

Huh? Obama is pro-life?

Well, I suppose if you think the answer to the question “when does life begin” is above your pay grade, then you can say you’re pro-life, because you don’t really know if there’s life there or not.

In any case, they’re not really trying to say that Obama favors restrictions on abortion, but the domain name and title of the site alone is extremely misleading, and a mischaracterization of Obama’s entire record on abortion.

The idea of the site is actually to try to convince pro-life voters to vote for Obama. But by refusing to admit that he has voted against protections for babies born alive from botched abortions, that he wants to put justices on the Supreme Court who believe an abortion is a Constitutional right (I’ll give $10,000 to the person who can find “abortion” in the Constitution), and who felt that the partial-birth abortion ban was “unconstitutional,” we now have a group of well-respected Christians engaging in behavior that is downright misleading and deceptive.

(Actually, they were already characterizing Obama this way. Now they’re just making their hypocrisy more explicit.)

All liberals want regarding abortion is to keep it from any kind of democratic debate. All the Matthew 25 Network wants to do is help the liberal media pull the wool over Christians’ eyes as they work to elect the most liberal senator, one who has never, ever, not once in his entire political career, believed that any abortion restriction was appropriate. Even to the point of sucking a baby’s brains out while they’re halfway delivered. A brutality his wife called “a legitimate medical procedure.”

Whatever you think, that is most certainly not a “culture of life.”

And if you disagree with my assessment of Obama, I challenge you – show me one vote that contradicts me. You won’t find it.

Think about that when you get ready to pull the lever for Obama in November.