What do you say? In the previous post, I encouraged grieving parents to receive everything as a gift.

But that’s not easy for them to do—especially at a time when they are confused, sad, and uncertain about their own future. (Who envisions their own future without their kids in the picture somewhere?)

Let me start with what not to say:

1. Do not — repeat! — do not pretend to speak for God. Keep your theology to yourself. If you think God needed another little flower in his garden, please don’t share that saccharine image with the parents. Trust me: it won’t help. (“God ought to get his OWN flower” would be a likely unspoken response.) Don’t say:

“Everything happens for a reason” (I heard this a lot)
“God is in this”
“We just have to trust that God’s doing something”

Please—this particular blog post isn’t the place for me to try to respond to these theologically questionable statements. From a merely practical side: these comments won’t help! When a child dies, everything is delicate. Don’t take a chance on tying God to the loss in ways that God hasn’t specifically told you to. The Christian conviction is that God is with us in our loss. He grieves, too. But the parents will have to come to know that through the dark valley of experience. It’s also true that God will “use” (that needs to be unpacked, I know) even this loss for his purposes. But again, this is something the ones in grief will have to recognize in the rearview mirror someday.

2. Do not attempt to diminish the pain.

“At least you have other kids.”
“At least it wasn’t like losing an older child.”
“At least she isn’t suffering any more.”

Rule of thumb: Don’t say anything that begins with “at least.”

3. Do not tell them you understand. Ok, if you’ve lost a child perhaps something like, “Our stories are so different, but they overlap. And as one who understands the pain, I’m so very sorry.” But other than that, don’t do it! The parent may come back and point out that you understand something about suffering. Great. But let the person in fresh grief make that connection.

4. Do not oversell the future. God will one day make things right. But this is not that day. As the writer of Ecclesiastes knew, there is a time to weep. This is that time.

So . . . what do you say? Here are some ideas:

- Nothing. Seriously, you don’t have to say anything. A nod, a hug, a tear—these are tomes of love. I remember an older woman putting her hand around my neck, kissing my check, and nodding. Her eyes were leaking. She spoke not one word, but all these years later she’s still comforting me through that moment.

- “I’m so sorry.” Less is more. This is enough: you’re sorry, you hate this for them, you’re with them.

- “I will be with you.” The fear is that everyone will rally around the funeral and bring chicken spaghetti for a week and then return to their lives and forget that your grief has just barely, BARELY begun.

- “I will never forget her (him).” Saying something about the child means that you will miss them but you will NOT forget them. We need that. (Just last week, a man who’s in his mid-40′s told me a Megan story from his college days—a story I either had forgotten or never knew. I felt like a little bit of her came back to me.) Eventually, this is something the parents may want you to explore more. What do you remember? What did you love about the child? What stories will stay with you?

- “I’m praying for you.” Good! You can work out all your theology in prayer. But the parents just need to know that others will be praying for them when they feel prayer less.

I’m guessing some will look back and wish you could take back some words you’ve offered from the past. It’s ok. We all learn as we go. I offer these suggestions not as a person mad at the insensitive things people say (although, trust me, I haven’t even begun to share the worst ones I’ve heard!) but as a friend who knows you mean well and want to help.

Remember this rule: if you don’t know what to say, nothing is just fine. Being present is the gift of gifts.

(More to follow in the series.)

used by permission

My next post will be about what you can say to someone who’s lost a child.

But first, a few words to those who experience the death of a child. My advice to you is this: receive everything as a gift.

People mean well. They are horrified for you. They know that nothing fits. Sometimes profound words come from them; at other times folks will say things that are stupid—things that could make you mad if you dwelt on them; and still others will tear up and have nothing to say.

But receive everything as a gift. If others had the perfect words to comfort you, that’s what they’d say. But they don’t. So they open their mouths, and stuff comes out. But the translation of that stuff is this: “I love you, I’m so sorry, I don’t understand, I’d give anything to remove this from you, I’ll be praying for you.”

You don’t have to respond with anything more than “thanks.” If you’re up to it, you might tell them that it’s important to you that people who knew your son or daughter help keep his or her memory alive. They’ll understand. (And you’ll understand many years later why that’s so important . . . when everyone else’s life has gone on.)

There are so many things to say about grief (and I tried to say some of them in Megan’s Secrets). But I’ll start here: receive everything as a gift. Even the most vacuous, ridiculous piece of pop theology (death brings out the worst!). Don’t analyze it; don’t rebut it.

Just receive it as the best gift your friend had to offer on that day.

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Here are the five:

1. I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

2. I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.

3. I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.

4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

Does this surprise you? What would you expect to hear of regrets about faith decisions? Does it match up with regrets you feel bubbling up inside (or is that a kind of revelatory wisdom that comes near the end of life)?

- Whose biological parents in Vietnam had her out of wedlock;

- Whose parents, out of shame and knowing they couldn’t be together, strapped bombs to themselves while holding her, attempting a family suicide;

- Who survived the explosion, though her parents both died, but lost both of her legs;

- Who was welcomed by Touch-a-Life ministry and was brought to Missouri, where she was adopted by the Shepherd family;

- Who is competing with prosthetic running legs.

Take the time. The interview is here.

used by permission

And that’s coming soon.

Along with more regular content!

I’ve been taking a blog break as I’ve launched a new ministry (“What Really Matters”), started preached regularly (Golf Course Road in Midland), and taken baby steps with my new role at Pepperdine as Director of Bible Lectures. (Even as I mention the latter, I’m breathing into a paper bag to prevent hyperventilation.)

So check back soon!

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I was fortunate to have gone to college at Cornerstone University in Grand Rapids, and one of the high fortunes was that Grand Rapids was filled with bookstores and book-reading folks. As a student I came into contact with some Calvinist friends, and that set me off into reading Calvinism, and beside the standard textbooks and theologies, the theologians I read the most were Calvin and John Owen. After four years, Kris and I moved to Chicagoland for seminary. When I got to Trinity in the Fall of 1976 as a student, the first thing I noticed was how tightly the theological discussion was ratcheted. These folks knew what they were talking about, and they knew biblical texts and theological discussions, and the history of the Church. It took some work just to be conversant. It was a challenge for which I am grateful to this day.

Calvinism was not a front-burner issue, but was on the stove top waiting for someone to say something uninformed. I had some wonderful lecturers: H. Dermott McDonald was an eccentric theologian from London who told us that our syllabus was the library and we should get over there and read up on “God, Man, and Christ” and then come take his exam at the end. David Wells taught Sin and Salvation, and began by telling us that his wife said that he could teach the first half of the class by giving an autobiography. McDonald was not a Calvinist; Wells was. My NT teachers didn’t raise such topics: Norm Ericsen and Murray Harris. But, then Grant Osborne came to TEDS. (So, I can blame this journey on Grant, which he’d be happy to take credit for.)

Here’s what happened. Grant is famous for his handouts, and he had one on Eternal Security. It was a lengthy handout and he asked me to work through it, add some bibliography, and generally re-write it. It was a big task for me, but it was the first real chance I had to do something at that level. To prepare for it, Grant suggested I read I. Howard Marshall, Kept by the Power of God. Which I did. From cover to cover; underlined it; took notes; checked commentaries. It took a good long while. When I came up for air in Hebrews I had been persuaded that I was wrong about Calvinism. Like C.S. Lewis getting on a bus and then getting off converted, but not knowing when or how, so with me: from the beginning of working through Grant’s notes to reading through Marshall and arguing with him until he wrestled me to the ground and pinned me, I had become convinced that I was no longer a Calvinist. Which didn’t mean I gave up the architecture of Calvinism, but I did then consider high Calvinism an inaccurate understanding of the fullness of the Bible.

It was and still is my conviction that the five points of Calvinism belong together, and both Horton’s and Olson’s recent books have confirmed that view. You might be able to give up #5 (Perseverance) somehow (I don’t think so, but some think so) and you might need to add a #6 (Responsiblity), but if the Arminian understanding of “losing salvation” is right, that is, if the effectual calling can be abandoned or undone, then high Calvinism is not right. (I’ll eventually show why the expression “losing salvation” isn’t optimal.) Let me say this more clearly: if God’s saving, effectual grace can be resisted somehow, if believers can somehow choose to forfeit their salvation, then unconditional election and irresistible grace (and probably limited atonement) and surely perseverance (as preservation) of the saints are not right.

There are (so I think) two major weaknesses in Calvinism’s theology (and also a disorientation in its architecture): first, the emphasis of its architecture is not the emphasis of the Bible. Its focus on God’s Sovereignty, which very quickly becomes much less a doctrine of grace than a doctrine of control and theodicy etc, and its overemphasis on human depravity are not the emphases of the Bible. The overemphasis of these two in high Calvinism comes more from Augustine and later Calvinists than from the rhetoric of the biblical authors. I do not dispute the presence of these themes; I dispute their narratival centrality and they are where the gravity of emphasis is found in the Bible. Yes, we all have metanarratives that put things together, and Calvinism is one such metanarrative. It works for some; it simply didn’t work for me.

Second, the exegesis of Calvinism on crucial passages is sometimes dead wrong. I was once standing, years later when I was teaching at Trinity, outside my door talking with two professors about my view of Hebrews, when I simply asked one of them, “Who do you think best answers the Arminian interpretation of Hebrews?” That professor said, “Philip Hughes.” I had just read Hughes and I thought it was weak. In fact, what I thought was this: “If that is the best, then there is no debate.” The other professor said, “I agree, Scot. Hughes doesn’t answer the questions.” Then he said, “I’m not sure any commentary really answers it well.” (Both of these professors were Calvinists, and still are, God bless ‘em.) What I’m saying is that the exegetical conclusions I was drawing (in all kinds of passages) were not answered adequately by the Calvinists I was reading. We all have to give them a fair shot. But at that time I had nothing to lose and it didn’t matter where I landed; I wanted to find out what the Bible said.

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To read the rest of Scot’s post, go here.

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I love these lines from a poem by John O’Donohue:

. . . Decide carefully
How you now can live
The life you would love
To look back on
From your deathbed.

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In the beginning was the Word. The Word was close beside God, and the Word was God. In the beginning, he was close beside God. All things came into existence through him; not one thing that exists came into existence without him. Life was in him, and this life was the light of the human race. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. (John 1:1-5)

used by permission

It’s a word pregnant with meaning for Believers around the world this morning as we live into the hope of Advent. We remember that God’s very first words in scripture, spoken to rebuke the chaos, were, “Let there be light!” We recall that when chaos struck again in Exile, the prophet Isaiah anticipated God’s new work by saying “Arise, shine, for the Light is come.”

And we believe, in the fulness of time that Light—the Light of the World—did shine among us. He exposed the darkness; he illuminated God’s Way; he brightened our hope.

But the damage to the left side of Giffords’ brain, the side that controls language, was so great that she couldn’t find the word. She tried again and again, but wound up with only frustrated tears. So the therapist began singing, and immediately Gabby Giffords joined right in word for word, “This little Light of Mine, I’m gonna let it shine.”

[PLAY CLIP]

The song, emerging from the right side of her brain, came out and helped restore the structure of her language center. It was the beginning of Rep. Giffords finding her own voice.

And for us, for those who still often feel like we live in the shadowlands, who seem to be groping about in darkness, we experience this meal in the same way. This simple meal helps retrieve our rhythm, pitch, and melody that gets lost in this damaged, wounded life. It sustains us once again, filling us with the life of the one who shines among us. The one who has illuminated our way. Who has invited us to join him as lights to his world.

This morning, on the first Sunday of Advent, as our brothers and sisters around the world remind each other that he who appeared once will appear again to restore all things, we affirm in this meal our belief that on that great day there will be no need for lamps or bulbs or candles or the sun, for he will be among us and will shine brightly.

Ok, minor corrrections. I didn’t shoot it. It’s not mine. It’s not technically about the Pepperdine Bible Lectures. But check out where this guy ends up. Yes: that’s exactly where he’s heading!

It helps, now and then, to step back and take a long view.
The kingdom is not only beyond our efforts,
it is even beyond our vision.
We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction
of the magnificent enterprise that is God’s work.
Nothing we do is complete, which is a way of saying
that the kingdom always lies beyond us.
No statement says all that could be said.
No prayer fully expresses our faith.
No confession brings perfection.
No pastoral visit brings wholeness.
No program accomplishes the church’s mission.
No set of goals and objectives includes everything.
It may be incomplete,
but it is a beginning, a step along the way,
an opportunity for the Lord’s grace to enter and do the rest.
We may never see the end results, but that is the difference
between the master builder and the worker.
We are workers, not master builders; ministers, not messiahs.
We are prophets of a future not our own.
This is what we are about.
We plant the seeds that one day will grow.
We water seeds already planted,
knowing that they hold future promise.
We lay foundations that will need further development.
We provide yeast that produces far beyond our capabilities.
We cannot do everything, and there is a sense of liberation
in realizing that. This enables us to do something,
and to do it very well.

Amen.

He’s claiming, in constrast to the clear view of scripture, that the earth moves around the sun. This heliocentric heresy is a flat denial of all we believe about the reliability, authority, and inerrancy of the Word of God.

Take, e.g., this story from Joshua 10:

“On the day the Lord gave the Amorites over to Israel, Joshua said to the Lord in the presence of Israel: ‘Sun, stand still over Gibeon, and you, moon, over the Valley of Aijalon.’ So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, till the nation avenged itself on its enemies.”

Could this be any clearer? The sun was stopped, not the earth. Scripture could not refute this heresy any more plainly.

We must urgently resist and reject and punish Galileo and heliocentrism! It comes down to whether we choose to believe the wild theories of science or the assured convictions of scripture.

What’s that about? Why have I kept going?

Great lectures and worship experiences
Seafood
Close friends
Mountains
Insightful classes (where freedom to stretch is offered)
Ocean and seabreeze
Eager learners

Summary: friends, teaching (giving and receiving), and MALIBU

So now I’m gonna follow the most successful lectureship director in the history of the planet. (OK, in the history of the American Restoration Movement.) We all knew someone had to be foolish enough to try to follow Jerry. It might as well be me.

I said “yes” finally for these reasons: what the lectures have meant to me for a quarter of a century, my belief in Pepperdine, my love for my religious heritage, and my confidence in Andy Benton, the school’s president.

So now . . . as the clock ticks toward my official starting date (5/15/12) . . . HELP ME think about the future of the Pepperdine lectureship. If you’ve been, what do you like about it? What do you hope remains the same? What are some ways in which you hope it might evolve as time moves (and as churches and our culture change)?

Shoot me your best suggestions!!

It was the same road that a couple hundred Highland people (including our son who’s been in the 2005 wreck) were traveling yesterday afternoon, heading to the Highland family retreat at the HEB encampment a Leakey, TX. He called saying that he was stuck in traffic on highway 83 with sirens all around and helicopters landing. It gave him a perspective on what many people observed while he lay injured in the ditch a few years back.

Please pray for the family of Anabel Reid, for those who are injured, and for the ACU community.

(Thanks to Hannah Vickers for this photo, taken from last night’s prayer vigil on the campus.)

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“Why’d you leave church?” I asked.

It’s a question I probably could have answered myself. I’ve heard the same story over and over from friends all around the US and Europe. I’ve heard it more in Nashville than just about anywhere else.

used with permission

“Our church became an echo chamber where the only voices or opinions we could hear were our own. People who questioned our brand of Christianity were considered suspect or dangerous. One day I went off the reservation and started reading books by thinkers I’d been told to watch out for. Thomas Merton, Richard Rohr, and Stanley Hauerwas were some that blew me away.

“Then what happened?” I asked.

“One Sunday I walked out of church and never went back,” he said. “I want spiritual community, I just don’t think the church as it is right now is where I’m going to find it.”

Most of the people I meet who are leaving church aren’t young. They’re in their forties and fifties. After years of reading off the same theological script they began yearning for deeper, more open conversations about faith that included considering diverse perspectives and conversations that widened rather than narrowed their souls. Their churches were either threatened by these folks or unprepared for their emergence.

My friend shared other reasons why people are leaving. They were edgier.

“Some of us began meeting gay people in committed relationships, and we couldn’t square what we were taught about human sexuality at church, with who we knew our gay friends were in real life. Others had neighbors who were raised in other religious traditions who lived out the values of the kingdom more consistently than we did.

One day I asked myself, “Isn’t it strange to tell these people that Jesus wants us to love our enemies and forgive seventy times seventy, but then he sends people to hell for not receiving him as their Lord? I kept asking friends and pastors at church what they thought about this stuff because it troubled me, but no one really wanted to talk deeply. They just went right to the scripted answers.”

“So you left church because you had too many questions?” I asked.

“I left my church because it didn’t honor my questions. I got pegged as having gone rogue,” he said, swallowing the last of his coffee and glancing at his watch.