"Those Who Do Not Yet Know Jesus" or "Missional Closers"

"You close or you hit the bricks! Decision -- have you made your decision for Christ?! And action... get out there! You got the prospects comin' in; you think they came in to get out of the rain? Guy doesn't walk on the lot unless he wants to buy. Sitting out there waiting to give you their money! Are you gonna take it? Are you man enough to take it?  .... Go and do likewise." (Blake from Glengarry Glen Ross)

By Larry Beane

There was a time (such as when the New Testament was still being written) when those who were not members of the Body of Christ were called "unbelievers."  At some point in our recent past, this term became politically incorrect among the mandarins of the Church Growth Movement.  And so instead we began to hear about the "unchurched."  The emphasis shifted from being a commentary on the lack of faith of the non-Christian, emphasizing instead his lack of relationship to the church.

But now, in these more missional (less churchly) times, a new word is called for.  And that new word is (as most politically-correct neologisms are) actually comprised of several words - in this case, a nice sacramental seven:

"Those who do not yet know Jesus."

This terminology is being used across denominational lines (a quick Google will show the cross-confessional  nature of the expression), and when it was being vocalized (and quite often) at my district's recent convention, there was a particular emphasis placed on the word "yet."  It was as though there was a memo that went out at corporate explaining the proper way to articulate and emote the slogan, as there was also quite often an audible and emphatic wavering of the voice to register the requisite amount of emotion: "Tho-o-o-se who do not YET (brief pause) kno-o-ow Jeeeee-sus."

We are in the deep South after all.

It is an interesting turn of phrase.  For unlike the term "unbeliever" - it does not address state of faith of the person to which it refers.  And unlike "unchurched" it doesn't focus on the relationship of the person to the Bride of Christ.  Instead, the verb used is "to know."  And it is a word that requires some context.  In Scripture, to "know" a person might mean to have a sexual relationship with him.  To "know" a person may indicate acquaintance, to be aware that he exists, or to have some kind of relationship with him (whether good or bad).  To "know" also points us toward rationality.  "Knowing" (rationality) is certainly a different category than "believing" (faith).

But here the emphasis is on "yet."

The expression speaks of Christianity as a state of knowing Jesus, and of the unbeliever as simply being in a state of temporary ignorance.  "Those who do not yet know Jesus" are people who are ignorant of Jesus, but presumably, when we do our job and teach them about Jesus, they will certainly become Christians (or more missionally-correct: "Jesus-followers") right along with us.  It is as though all we need to do is tell them and they will convert, teach them, and they will join, relieve them of their ignorance, and they will drop their current religions (whether they are Wicca or work) to become disciples of our Lord Jesus Christ.  It is a variation on the line from Field of Dreams: "If you build it..."

But what about unbelievers who do know Jesus but have rejected him?  The expression "those who do not yet know Jesus" makes no provision for those who know Christ but have no desire to submit to Him.  With such people, the "yet" is not just incorrect, it's arrogant.  One of the reasons cited by our culture for its hatred of Christianity is its supposed arrogance.  Usually, the allegation is based on a caricature or distortion of the church - or at very least, based on representations of Christianity that are unflattering.  However, I have to say, in this case, the charge is true.  The term "those who do not yet know Jesus" is terribly arrogant.  Can you imagine if Muslims referred to us as "those who do not yet know Mohammed"?  The presumption would be that the only reason we would not be Muslims is our ignorance of their religion's founder.  And if they only give us the right information, the right sales job, the right education, the right program script - we would be Allah-followers.

I think this is a terribly disrespectful and condescending way to speak about unbelievers.  For very few unbelievers are truly ignorant of Jesus.  Most people have heard something about Jesus, at very least.  Most people have some contact with Christians of some form.  Even Atheists typically have December 25 as a day off work, and it would be hard indeed to find a Jew or Muslim who is ignorant that a lot of people living in his community worship a Jew named Jesus and consider Him to be God.  There are many unbelievers who are quite learned in Scripture and church history.  The reason they are unbelievers has nothing to do with ignorance.

There is also a thread of Arminianism running through the term.  For it connects one's state of being a Christian (i.e. one who holds the catholic faith of the Triune God and the Divine Incarnation of Jesus) to "knowing" (which is rational) - and then typically makes it the job of Christians - clergy and lay alike - to "tell" the one "who does not yet know Jesus" about Jesus.  Thus confessing the faith becomes a kind of sales-job ("get the message out" or as said in our more missionally-correct times, we need to "tell our story").  We just need to get out there and close the deal.  If the customers only knew how great our vacuum cleaners were, they would be buying them.  "Hit the bricks, pal!"  "Always be closing!"

This was the problem with the late Ablaze! program that was jammed down the throats of LCMS Lutherans a few years ago.  It treated confessing the faith as a quantifiable business transaction that was subject to being logged and counted toward a corporate sales goal.  The program (shockingly) explicitly did not include Holy Baptism as a so-called "critical event" to be logged.  And this program was sold as a means to start thousands of new LCMS churches in the U.S. and around the world.  Based on these projections, church workers (including pastors) were aggressively recruited for the tsunami of new churches that would be built ("if you build it...") through this salesmanship.  Instead, we're seeing record numbers of seminary candidates stranded on Call Night.  We now have a glut of pastors and lay church workers.  Synodical policy goals grew out of rosy estimates based on Ablaze! ("if you build it...").  It's hard enough to project sales of products (in spite of focus groups and market research), let alone to turn the Holy Spirit's ministry into something to be carved up on a PowerPoint pie graph and subjected to number crunching on a whiteboard at Corporate.

And now even though Ablaze! was allowed to go quietly into the night, our bureaucrats and bean counters are scouring the neo-Evangelical world looking for the Next Great Evangelism Program - without regard to the doctrine of election, to the mysterious work of the Holy Spirit, the cross, and without reference to Holy Baptism as the means by which the Second Birth happens.  The new hype centers around the idea of "missional communities" - which for some reason, typically involves coffee.  I cannot help wondering if "Blake" (Alec Baldwin) from Glengarry Glen Ross will one day be invited to speak to a "Missional Summit" (which is what church conferences seem to be called in our brave missional world) railing at us that "coffee is for closers only!"

At some point we are going to have to disavow ourselves of the sales model and come to grips with our Lord's metaphor that the Kingdom is a Narrow Path that few find.  Those on the Broad Road are seldom there because they are ignorant of Jesus.  It is a good and fitting thing to confess the faith, to give an answer for the reason of the hope within us, to articulate what the Christian faith is and who our Lord Jesus is - speaking the truth in love.  But we should not be so arrogant as to think that if we only teach people the right things, serve the right coffee, wear the right clothes, use the right buzzwords ("if you build it..."), and implement the right program or gimmick, unbelievers will become members of the Church.

Maybe there is an unintended consequence of the arrogance of the expression "those who do not yet know Jesus" (as well-intentioned as it is).  And maybe that consequence is a rejection of Jesus because of the arrogance of His followers.  And maybe the proper way to speak to such people is humility in our clear confession instead of fuzzy buzzwords, slick programs, and marketing schemes based on the presumption of the ignorance of the unbeliever.

We are called to be confessors of the faith, not closers of the deal.

"I'm here from downtown.... And I'm here on a mission of mercy." 

Of "Father" and "Mass"

Since its inception Gottesdienst has included the title Father for clergymen and the term Mass for, well, for the Mass, as part of its style guide. This, along with the chasubles, chanting, and genuflecting will sometimes provoke the charge of "too Catholic" or "weirdos" or even things less complimentary. In the past some well meanings folks have suggested that we just drop all the Catholic lingo: we'd get way more traction in our goals of restoring Lutheran worship if we just referred to clergymen as Pastor and the Mass as the Divine Service.

However, Gottesdienst is a journal of the Lutheran liturgical tradition - a tradition that includes all of the above. To set those terms aside to curry favor with the unconvertable champions of innovation would be to undo the whole point of the journal.

Nevertheless, from time to time it is good to review why we use these terms and how they are indeed part of the Lutheran tradition.

First, Mass. Does anyone seriously not know that this is the chief term used in the Lutheran Confessions for the Sunday Communion Service? If you don't believe me, just go to bookofconcord.org and do a search. It's right there, for example, in AC/Ap XXIV "we don't abolish the Mass but keep it religiously." Yup, that's us.

Second, Father. Let's start with Johan Gerhard's Theological Commonplaces: On the Ministry section 26:

And, likewise, [ministers] are called "fathers" (2 Kings 6:21). This title is repeated in the New Testament (I Cor. 4:15; Gal. 4:19) not merely for the sake of honor but also because through the Word they beget spiritual children to God - instrumentally, that is; and in this sense and respect they are said to save both themselves and their hearers (I Tim. 4:16). 

Or again, how about the Large Catechism:

Besides these there are yet spiritual fathers; not like those in the Papacy, who have indeed had themselves called thus, but have performed no function of the paternal office. For those only are called spiritual fathers who govern and guide us by the Word of God;159] as St. Paul boasts his fatherhood 1 Cor. 4:15, where he says: In Christ Jesus I have begotten you through the Gospel. Now, 160] since they are fathers they are entitled to their honor, even above all others. But here it is bestowed least; for the way which the world knows for honoring them is to drive them out of the country and to grudge them a piece of bread, and, in short, they must be (as says St. Paul, 1 Cor. 4:13) as the filth of the world and everybody's refuse and footrag.

Shucks, even Fr. Walther himself was known to use the term. And in our day of so many denominations ordaining women, might not a title that directly confesses the manner in which Jesus instituted the ministry have some worth?

I serve in rural Illinois. Folks call the Mass "Church" and they call me "Pastor," or "Reverend," or "Preacher."   And that's just fine - those are all part of our tradition as well, but they are in no danger of being lost. The terms "Mass" and "Father" each have something unique to confess and have fallen into disuse and calumny. So we use them at Gottesdiesnst and encourage our readers to get reacquainted with them. Where I serve that means we talk about them in Bible Class - these are good conversations that lead the people into the richness of the Lutheran heritage.

+HRC

The Not-So-Triumphant Entry and the Cleansing of the Temple: Thoughts on Trinity 10

Of all the Gospels, Luke alone makes explicit the connection between Jesus' entry into Jerusalem and the judgment of God on the city, which begins in the cleansing of the Temple. Jesus said:

"And when he drew near and saw the city, he wept over it, saying, 'Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. And they will not leave one stone upon another in you, because you did not know the time of your visitation.'" (Luke 19:41-44)

The day that Jesus is referring to when he says "on this day" is the same thing as "the time of your visitation." And that day is the day he enters Jerusalem on a donkey, the day he is hailed specifically as "the King who comes in the name of the Lord" (Luke 19:38).

Typically we view our Lord's entry into Jerusalem as his triumphal entry. But if this is the case, why does he then curse the city of Jerusalem who just greeted and received him as the King who comes in the name of the Lord? Why does he pronounce God's judgment instead of God's blessing upon the city?

In ancient times, it was common for important people to be welcomed into cities by a long line people, who lined up outside of the city gates to greet and laud the person as they entered into the city. This is especially true if the visitor was the King or the Emperor or the Ruler. This type of visitation was called a parousia (see TDNT, V:858ff). When a ruler would make a parousia, he would expect to be received by the religious and political elite from the city as well as other members of the city, adorned in ornamental clothing, to escort him into the city. The visitor would be brought into the square where he would be lauded by speeches of gratitude for the privilege of being visited. And finally, the parousia would end when the members of the city gave the visitor a tour of the local temple. And if an important person came to a city and wasn't welcomed with a parousia, there would be hell to pay. For this was a statement of ingratitude for previous benefaction. That city would be cut off from the visitor's benefaction (the previous analysis is from Brent Kinman, "Parousia, Jesus' 'A-Triumphal' Entry, and the Fate of Jerusalem," JBL 118:2 [Summer 1999] 279-294).

Luke's account of Jesus' entry into Jerusalem is anti-climactic compared to those of the other Gospels. And noticeably absent in the welcoming committee are all the Jewish leaders, and if they are present, they are hostile. Where are the Scribes? Where are the Pharisees? Where are the Chief Priests? Where are Herod and the Herodians? They "were seeking to destroy him" (Luke 19:47). They were snubbing the King who comes in the name of the Lord. And so they were snubbing the Lord himself. They did not on that day, the day of the King's parousia visitation, welcome him, speak well of him, and thank him for his gifts. Instead they treated his and his Father's house as a den of robbers.

What if the King who comes in the name of the Lord came to your city? Would they know on that day the things that make for peace? Would they recognize the time of their visitation, the time of his parousia? Would they celebrate the gifts he has given? Would they be dressed for the occasion? Would they know? Would they care?

He came them, not to bring peace but a sword, so that when He comes now, he does not come with a sword but with the peace of God. He comes not to condemn, but to forgive and to give life. He comes to give his body and his blood into your mouths to open your throats and lips to sing of His glorious deeds. He comes to give. He comes for you.

Welcome to the New Breed

By Larry Beane

HT: Dr. William Tighe

Welcome to the "New Breed of Catholicism."

Our Lord warned "do not give dogs what is holy" (Matt 7:6).  One can only imagine how little one must actually believe in the holiness of the sacramental elements to (literally) feed the Lord's body to a dog.

Such behavior may be couched in love of animals and inclusiveness, but what it really demonstrates is a hatred of God and an exclusiveness against His Word.  For to show such contempt toward the Sacrament is nothing other than contempt for the Word - the Word Inscribed and the Word Incarnate.

Such a desecration is completely consistent with the arrogance inherent in having lay people preach and having women step into the roles of liturgists, preachers, pastors, and deacons.  Couched in equality and social justice, it is really a sense of inequality (the belief that somehow a "hearer" is less of a child of God than a "preacher") and of injustice against women - refusing to protect them from the seductive whisper of Satan: "Did God actually say...?" (Gen 3:1).

Same sin different day.

And lest we fall into our old habits of patting ourselves on the backs for being The True Visible Church On Earth!™, let us not forget our own shameful recent history of placing lay people into such roles - especially now that the door to allowing women preachers in the LCMS is standing ajar.

Maybe we're on the cusp of a New Breed of LCMS Lutheranism?

Deacon Deborah Gnad's Commissioning on December 12
  

Women preachers/deacons in the LCMS

In a way, my heart is strangely warmed by the fact that the Atlantic District now officially has women preachers (deacons). For a long time those of us who have complained about the MO Synod tossing out AC XIV have pointed out that if you are going to let lay men act like pastors, what is to stop you from letting lay women act like pastors? Either no one who is uncalled to the Office may preach and administer the Sacraments, or everybody can. Well, now it's QED, as you can see below.

HT: Fr. Josh Osbun and the Stand Firm blog.


A few highlights of the program from the Atlantic District’s Diaconate Guidelines document:
4.1 At the heart of the ministry of deacons are works of mercy, witness, and worship, in solidarity with the poor and needy. The actual tasks undertaken by members of the diaconate will vary according to the gifts and skills of the deacon and the needs of the church and its surrounding community. Deacons so gifted will engage in various ministries of teaching within the congregation/agency, including baptismal and communion preparation, catechesis of youth and adults, and small group Bible study leadership or supervision. All aspects of diaconal ministry are under the supervision of the supervising pastor.

4.2 Members of the diaconate assume a leadership role in worship, but this is never to be their primary task. Rather, the serving function of deacons in the Church’s liturgy is to be a reflection of their tangible, actual servant hood in the world.

4.3 Members of the district diaconate shall neither preside at the Holy Eucharist nor exercise the Office of the Keys. In the absence of an ordained pastor and with approval of the pastor and congregation, the deacon may serve at the divine service including the communion liturgy using reserved sacrament. This practice should be used sparingly so as to not confuse the “Office of Deacon” and the “Office of Pastor.” The deacon may officiate at funerals under the direction of a supervising pastor. The deacon may proclaim the Gospel in formal and informal settings after he/she has received training in homiletics and while remaining under the supervision of an ordained pastor.

5.5 It is expected that most members of the district diaconate will continue to hold regular employment and therefore would be involved in diaconal service on a part-time, non-stipendiary basis. There may be instances however, when a deacon serves a ministry for a stipend….