Zion

If we believe the Bible, then shouldn't we all be Zionist?

There are a lot of things I feel that mature Christians can disagree about -- for me, I think there are a number of issues that are certainly important, but it's probably okay if believers don't come to clear conclusions on them because the issues aren't necessarily clear themselves:

1. Predestination vs. Free Will
2. Creationism vs. Biblical Evolution.
3. Different Eschatologies
4. Other important issues.

But I do feel like all Christians who take the Bible seriously should be Zionist.

I bring it up because my roommate is anti-Israel. Not anti-Semitic, I'm pretty sure, just anti-Israel.

There's something of a progression for the Gentile believer, and I guess I'll lay out some of the thoughts that go into it. What do you make of verses like these?

I establish My covenant between Me and you and your descendants after you in their generations, for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and your descendants after you. Also I give to you and your descendants after you the land in which you are a stranger, all the land of Canaan, as an everlasting possession; and I will be their God. -- Genesis 17

How shall we sing the Lord's song in a foreign land? If I forget you, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget its skill! If I do not remember you, let my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth -- if I do not exalt Jerusalem above my chief joy. -- Psalm 137

For Zion's sake, I will not hold my peace, and for Jerusalem's sake, I will not rest, until her righteousness goes forth as brightness and her salvation as a lamp that burns. The Gentiles shall see your righteousness and all kings your glory. As a young man marries a virgin, so shall your sons marry you; and as a bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall God rejoice over you. -- Isaiah 62

I have set watchmen on your walls, O Jerusalem; They shall never hold their peace, day or night. You who make mention of the Lord, do not keep silent, and give Him no rest till He establishes and till He makes Jerusalem a praise in the earth. And they shall call them The Holy People, The Redeemed of the Lord; And you shall be called Sought Out, A City Not Forsaken. -- Isaiah 62

O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing! See! Your house is left to you desolate, for I say to you, you shall see Me no more, until you say, "Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!" -- Matthew 23

And of course, the entirety of Romans 11.

The Christian believer now runs into a few options, all of which have many subscribers:

a) Replacement Theology. The Church is effectively the new Israel.
b) Christian Semitism. We are called to love the Jewish people because of Jesus.
c) Christian Zionism. We are called to love the Jewish people and support the state of Israel because of Jesus.

Here's a link that'll give you a lot to think about.

Do some thinking and praying. This is important -- it is clear that the matter is important to God. As a Christian, are you called to feel or act a certain way towards Israel or the Jewish people? I'll update this one later, but what do you think?

Fight Club

So I saw the movie Fight Club for the first time in its entirety, and I really, really liked it. I don't think it's a movie Christians are supposed to like. Not because of all the violence and sex and profanity, necessarily, but because its hero, Tyler Durden, is awesome and larger-than-life, and he's unapologetically nihilistic, disestablishmentarianist, uninhibited, destructive, hormonal, and everything Galatians 5 is not.

I spend a lot of time with movies like these thinking, "Fuck it! Why not?" and wondering whether I should feel guilty for that.

I suspect a lot of guys identify strongly with the movie. In a lot of ways, it was like Wild at Heart. Its message was primarily an anti-consumerist one, but to the males in the audience, it said, you've been emasculated by society, your idea of an adventure right now is to order something new and different from IKEA, and it's time to break through the constructed walls you've set up and do something awesome and feel pain and feel alive for the first time. I don't think that's inherently a bad message. It smacks of the attacks the New Testament brings against legalism and artifice. And it reminded me a lot of Wild at Heart. But the issue I had with Wild at Heart was that it glorified the means, and not the end. Jesus is more or less your safari guide to a life of adventure. Sure, it's great to be wild and adventurous and pursue things with, what was that overused phrase, "reckless abandon," but where do you go with it? What happens when you need some discipline to attain something great?

I know there are a lot of compelling reasonable reasons not to identify with Fight Club and not to admire Tyler Durden, but I'm a pretty impulsive person who can forget why I try to live how I try to live pretty easily because I identify easily with stories and characters. I have an active imagination that leads me to identify strongly with other perspectives more than to judge and distill their merit. I read Through Painted Deserts and I really want to take a spontaneous, unplanned road trip. I read Ender's Game and I feel like Ender, too smart and too capable and too destined for a normal life. I read The Sun Also Rises and I think I'm disillusioned and feel like sitting around somewhere like Spain idly, fishing and drinking because there's nothing better for me and my Lost Generation to do. So when I watch or read or think about an appealing character or story that brings along an un-biblical philosophy, it's hard for me to get off the bus and to re-center myself by remembering Christianity -- to me, it just feels like swapping one philosophy or paradigm or system for another.

Maybe that's why in 2 Timothy 2, Paul writes to Timothy to "remember Jesus Christ." It seems obvious in biblical context, usually because we've been reading the Bible or we're surrounded by Christians when we take a look at 2 Timothy. But maybe Timothy was like me, and maybe Timothy had times when he was hanging out with the gnostics, and they were talking about how God was transcendent beyond the confines of this physical world, which is just a construct anyway, and maybe Timothy knew that logically, metaphysically, it was crap, but found himself nodding along and agreeing anyway because it was compelling and answered some questions for him. But the person of Jesus, the way He walked and saw the world, and sees the world, and shares His perspective and His love and His character is incredibly gripping too, in a way that an ethical paradigm or a religious practice is not.

Maybe the best way to forget Tyler Durden is to think of Jesus. Maybe that's why Timothy and I both needed to hear what sounds so unnecessary to say -- "remember Jesus Christ."

The One

"If I wasn't made for you, then why does my heart tell me that I am?"

I think a lot of young Christian guys and girls have to wrestle with the idea of The One: whether there is one specific pre-ordained, pre-destined girl out there that I'm supposed to find or be with, or whether any nice, godly girl has the potential to be my future wife, given enough time, care, love, and grace.

If there were only The One:

- That would coincide well with a lot of biblical precedent, such as Isaac and Rebekah.
- I could believe that the girl I marry is by definition The One, since God orchestrates His will in our lives.
- I could conversely believe that the girl I marry might not be The One, since we can sin and foul up God's plan for us, and I would probably wonder with every girl whether she's The One or not, especially when things got sticky or complicated or imperfect.
- I would be very upset and frustrated if I ended up alone or single past the age of forty or so. I'd try to take comfort in the fact that maybe God's timing is different than my expectations, but probably I'd just feel like I missed the boat when it passed by.

If The One is not a valid idea:

- Then I could conceivably make it with any godly, lovely girl, since love is an act of will and commitment and work and sacrifice, not just attraction and emotion.
- Then I wouldn't be tied to wondering constantly whether the girl is The One because I've in essence made her The One.
- That last conclusion might lead to a very works-centered approach to my relationship.
- Also, what prevents me from having multiple relationships with multiple women? Since there is no magical One, there can certainly be Two, right? Or is there just One, and she's not specific? Also, is there any drawback to just cutting my losses and moving on from a hard relationship, since I'm not forsaking any The One girl?

Whenever I've had this discussion with people, it always brings up a number of strangely familiar issues about how God's will plays into what happens, what doesn't happen, what might have happened, or what should happen in our lives. Do we have a say? Do we have an active role? Is that from us or from God? Is foreknowledge the same as control and responsibility?

Pat Hastings made the great point that this discussion boils down to predestination vs. free will for a good reason. One of the big points of finding a wife and the institution of marriage is to model Christ and His church. So it makes sense that we'd run into the same questions.

I was at my friend Russell's wedding in North Carolina this weekend, and I really think Russell found his The One woman in Katherine. But I think it also took him a lot of labor, love, grace, and sacrifice to get there.

1 Cor 3:5-9

5 What, after all, is Apollos? And what is Paul? Only servants, through whom you came to believe—as the Lord has assigned to each his task. 6 I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow. 7 So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow. 8 The man who plants and the man who waters have one purpose, and each will be rewarded according to his own labor. 9 For we are God's fellow workers; you are God's field, God's building.

It's a very simple analogy: our ministry is like the farmer, planting and watering, and waiting on the Lord to deliver the miraculous increase. But I think this analogy helps us avoid a lot of traps, especially in evangelism. I used it in a brief study today.

- If we forget that God gives the increase, then we start to believe that evangelism is wholly our labor. This notion can lead to a few things. We begin to believe that we're directly responsible for the entire outcome of all our actions and conversations. We suddenly feel like we're under enormous pressure to share the gospel, in its entirety, to a person who might not be ready to hear everything. We can fall to spiritual pride, taking the credit for results that were entirely God's doing, and forgetting that we are, as Paul says, only servants. We also fall to doubt. When we see that an approach isn't the most promising, as initiative evangelism sometimes seems unworkable, then we can easily decide to give in to doubt and forgo trying, forgetting the surprising miraculousness of God and forgetting that it is often an act of faith, and that we haven't got God all figured out.

- If we forget that we have a role in the planting, sowing, and harvesting, then we also fall into a few traps. In attributing the growth of a harvest wholly to the mysterious workings of God, we can begin to believe very literally in "no fail evangelism," where any attempt is considered valuable because God can and does bless every attempt made in faith to spread His word. I've seen a lot of pushy evangelists that have really turned their listeners off to the gospel who say in earnest, "Mission accomplished: I did my part, and now it's up to them and God as to what they do with it." The other extreme can also follow if we forget our own role: we have no reason to follow the Great Commission, since God does all the work anyway. A farmer who recognizes that God gives him the crop harvest every year doesn't just not do any work planting or watering -- he recognizes that his labor is the way God has chosen to bring about the harvest.

- Sometimes we think, more sowing means more harvest, and we toss the seeds wildly, instead of carefully plowing and nurturing the plants. Sometimes we think too hard on nurturing one plant, forgetting the breadth of our fields and that we are to be efficient laborers and stewards for God.

There's a lot you can take from that particular analogy. Is it God who does the work in people's hearts? Yes. So do I really have an important role in the growth of God's kingdom? Romans 10 provides some insight:

14 How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? 15 And how can they preach unless they are sent?

God can make a crop grow from nothing. Don't believe He can't. But He chooses to use the hardworking farmer to bring it about by patience, sweat, faith, and diligence. I think that's some simple wisdom.