LASIK

As Jesus was approaching Jericho, a blind man was sitting by the road begging. Now hearing a crowd going by, he began to inquire what this was. They told him that Jesus of Nazareth was passing by. And he called out, saying, "Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!" Those who led the way were sternly telling him to be quiet; but he kept crying out all the more, "Son of David, have mercy on me!" And Jesus stopped and commanded that he be brought to Him; and when he came near, He questioned him, "What do you want Me to do for you?" And he said, "Lord, I want to regain my sight!" And Jesus said to him, "Receive your sight; your faith has made you well." Immediately he regained his sight and began following Him, glorifying God; and when all the people saw it, they gave praise to God. - Luke 18:35-43, NASB

Well, I've had no miraculous healing, but I tell you what, LASIK is about as close as you can get. Friday almost two weeks ago I had LASIK surgery on both eyes. My eyes weren't horrible. I could function fine without contacts if I needed to, but I couldn't legally drive without them. I now see 20/15. It doesn't get much better than that!

The entire procedure took somewhere around 10 minutes for both eyes. It's a two-stage procedure. First they cut a flap in my cornea. I paid extra for them to cut the flap with a laser instead of a blade. Second, they peel the flap back, and a second laser adjusted my vision. From my perspective, it seemed just like I was lying there watching a blinking red light. And I could see my vision changing as it worked. Finally, they put the flap back in place, and I could see. Simple as that. Each stage for each eye took 20 seconds. Incredible!

When we got through, all I could think about was that I wanted to take a nap. Katie drove me home and I went straight to sleep. When I woke up, there was no pain, no drowsiness, no anything. I felt 100%. And I could see 20/15. They made me wear goggles for 24 hours, and then every night for 10 nights, so that I wouldn't accidentally rub my eyes. And I'm just now getting to the end of the medicated eye drops that are supposed to aid the healing process.

Is that a miracle? Well, not in the same sense as what Jesus did in Jericho. Still, I attribute it to God and His power. In this case, God worked through a long history of inventors, scientists, and doctors to develop the technology, and then He worked through the doctor that did the surgery. And He has been working through my body in the healing process. God is at work, every day. Perhaps we should restore our sense of awe at what He does, especially through us humans.

Immediately he regained his sight and began following Him, glorifying God; and when all the people saw it, they gave praise to God.

So an issue that has come up several times in recent discussions is whether God calls us to be faithful or to be successful. This is an important issue in various missions paradigms. Central to the church growth school is that Christ said not “Go try your hardest to make disciples and I’ll be okay with that” but “Go make disciples.” He expects us to actually get results. Therefore, the advocates of the church growth approach spend enormous amounts of efforts researching, analyzing, and evaluating methods in order to be the most effective. On the other side of the issue are many evangelicals, especially of the Calvinistic stripe, who stress that all mission success depends on God – we are simply privileged to be tagging along. Since God judges the heart, all that He cares is that we are faithful, that we try our hardest.

So where do you land? Are we shooting for faithfulness or success? More importantly, where does God land?

Okay, I can’t claim to speak for God. He’s fully able to speak for himself. On the other hand, he has spoken in Scripture. I think particularly of the OT prophets. They seem to be the epitome of the faithful and ultimately unsuccessful ministers. How did God feel about them? Well, actually, it was his idea in the first place. Consider his call to Isaiah:

God: Who will go for us?

Isaiah: Here I am, send me.

God: Okay, go preach. Preach and expose the stubbornness of these people.

(Isaiah thinks, “Uh, I’m not sure this is what I signed up for…)

Isaiah: How long, Lord?

God: Until cities lie devastated and without inhabitant, houses are without people, and the land is utterly desolate.

And that is what Isaiah did. He preached faithfully for years and years, and just as God had foretold, the people didn’t listen. Success, in any tangible sense, was not even in the picture. Jeremiah, similarly, became excessively bitter because of the lack of “success,” and he let God know about it. But he too remained faithful. The prophets spent their lives trying to fulfill their commission. Success was not the measure of God’s pleasure with them. Perhaps it’s not with us either.

My Modern Medieval Monster

Here's a thought prompted by history class today. During medieval times, three orders of society crystallized. There were:

1. Those who fight (knights, nobles, lords)
2. Those who work (serfs, peasants)
3. Those who pray (monks, priests, clerics)

These orders of society were indications of professionalization. In other words, those who fought were the only ones who fought; they fought on behalf of the whole society. Similarly, the serfs did the manual labor for the whole community. More interestingly to me, the clerics did all the praying for the society. In general, others (whether lords or peasants) didn't do their own praying. When they felt the need for God's intervention, they asked the priest to pray for them.

That's all very interesting, but what does that have to do with us? We don't continue the same "professionalization of prayer." As good ol' Protestants, we each pray individually. But with a little further reflection, it seems like we continue the same tradition with a twist: we have a very definite "professionalization of theology." Our "clerics" do the thinking for the whole community. When others (whether lords or peasants) have questions about God, they don't often dig through those questions themselves. Rather, they ask the preacher (who in turn asks the commentaries).

Am I wrong? I'm sure most of us want to react against this criticism. And obviously I'm over-generalizing. There are many dedicated Christians who spend much time contemplating on the things of God. But I think what I'm saying is still an accurate broad picture of our church. And what are we going to do about it? I'm a poor one to bring up this subject - my training is making me a professional thinker! It's like trying to reverse the negative effects of monasticism by becoming a monk.

So I'll leave this to you who still have a chance...

NR Thoughts

If you haven't already read Greg's entry on Neo-Restoration and Bobby's parody thereof, do so. Get a move on. What are you waiting for?

As I said in response to Greg's post, I am inclined to say that there is validity in trying to restore something of the NT church, even though that doesn't mean restoring their patterns of practice. I'll admit I'm still a bit fuzzy on what that might be. One reason I'm convinced that it's worth searching for is that God decided to give us Acts and the NT epistles. Our goal of emulating Jesus (and that is our goal, is it not?) does not exclude emulating the early church. If it did, the NT would need only the Gospels. Rather, the example of the NT church helps us to know how to emulate Jesus. It's analogous to 1 Cor. 11:1.

I appreciate Mark's comment to Greg's post. I think he hit the nail on the head. I really have no idea what hermeneutic to aim for. Someone help us out. I know a few things that need to change, but I don't have a coherent understanding of what needs to replace them.

Here are a few thoughts on practicalities. In other words, these thought won't help us arrive at a better hermeneutic, but rather will help us frame it as we seek to put it into practice.

• A Neo-Restoration hermeneutic needs to be packaged simply. A complex ivory tower solution will do little to help real churches, unless we work on a completely top-down denominational hierarchy. The Church of Christ focus on the priesthood of all believers, which I think is largely a healthy focus, demands that this hermeneutic be available to all. Command, example, and inference may have many weaknesses, but one strength is that it is simple to say, simple to understand, and (relatively) simple to execute. The ordinary guy on the pew can use it as a tool to figure out what the Bible means to his situation. Whatever replaces it will have to be similarly accessible.


• We must realize that Churches of Christ are not homogeneous. Rural traditional churches still constitute a majority of the movement, while large suburban churches gain more and more impetus toward general evangelicalism. The middle ground is being stretched dangerously thin. Many progressive congregations have already given up on the old hermeneutic, without thoughtfully replacing it. It will be tempting for us (i.e. future ministers) to lead this left wing of churches to a better hermeneutic, abandoning the right wing in the process. I'm not interested in being a part of that kind of move. Our challenge will be to help the entire movement come to a more solid hermeneutical foundation. Is not unity a key goal in this whole question?


• Speaking of unity, a NR movement is inadequate if it can't see further than the Churches of Christ. Isa. 49:6 is completely appropriate. Salvation to the ends of the earth is vital. But let's realize that restoring Israel and Judah is also no small task - it encompasses many more denominations than just the Churches of Christ. I understand that God has placed us in this fellowship right now, but if our goal is simply to bless the current Churches of Christ, we contribute to a sectarian mindset. I appreciate the example of the earliest RM leaders who strove to win anyone that would listen, even whole congregations, regardless of denominational affiliation.

Okay, those are some of my thoughts for now.