Category: Ministry

Volume != Passion

image In the February 2009 issue of Christianity Today, John Stackhouse has a penetrating piece on the trend toward louder worship bands in the church. (You can read the text on his blog by going here.) The core premise of his essay is that we have lost the intent of the musicians in the church. They are to accompany the praise of the congregation, supporting our voices with rhythm, melody, and key as we lift our hearts in song to our Father who we came to worship. The trend has gone in the other direction however. The praise band have become performers in many cases who feel that they must then project their music onto us as though we were attending a concert.

Though no worship band has yet to reach Motorhead-at-the-Warfield sound pressures, the volume in some cases has become annoyingly loud. Besides the physical discomfort of poorly mixed loudness, the volume has an effect that many worship leaders have failed to note. When you cannot hear your voice or those near you, the tendency is to not sing or to sing quietly. Look around you this week if your church uses a high volume praise band and make note of the number of people not singing but instead, simply watching the ‘performers.’ An important part of singing in worship is not often discussed; you are often singing for the benefit of others around you. When a person is unable to raise their own voice in praise due to their pain, suffering, depression, etc. many times it is the sound of your voice that lifts them up and gives them hope. When drowned out by the sound of crash cymbals, an opportunity for love can be lost.

Has your praise group become performers? Has the worship service become so choreographed and scheduled to the second that there is no room for the Spirit to work? When I think back to churches I have visited in which there was a lone pianist who played the melody and God was serenaded by the majority of people in the room and contrast it with some of the production oriented services I have been too, I come to conclusion that the pendulum has swung too far to one side and perhaps it is time for the arc to begin to come back in the other direction. Worship leaders, can you hear us?

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Friction Free Worship

As I’ve thought more about the impediments introduced by the church coffee shop and bookstore, I see a great deal of value in moving in the opposite direction of the “mall church” trend and instead designing a friction-free worship environment. This would be one which leads a worshipper directly from the narthex to the chancel (or in modern language, from the doorway to the altar) with as few obstacles as possible. Consider this passage from Isaiah as we reflect on the intentional design of our celebration event;

A voice of one calling: In the desert prepare the way for the Lord; make straight in the wilderness a highway for our God. (Isa 40:3)

and this one

And it will be said: “Build up, build up, prepare the road! Remove the obstacles out of the way of my people. (Isa 57:14)

image Each of these verses serves the larger context of the passage in describing the movement of the Lord to the holy place in which He meets with His people. Because He is the King, his people’s desire is to smooth the way for their meeting by removing obstacles and straightening the path so that there is as little friction as possible in His movement toward the destination.

I’m getting the feeling that the ‘all-in-one’ church design is beginning to deter from the core reason for the Sunday celebration. We may not all agree but from the perspective of a pastor, my understanding of the Sunday (or Saturday or Tuesday as it applies) gathering is the corporate worship of God. With this objective placed properly in the hierarchy we can then clearly examine the effect that other activities might have on accomplishing this goal. For example, an issue I raised in an earlier post has to do with the distraction caused by the church coffee shop. It has a certain stickiness, an attractiveness that introduces friction on the path to worship. I am tempted to stop and enjoy a cup of coffee on my way to sanctuary, perhaps justifying it as fellowship, rather than moving deliberately toward the altar, physically and mentally.

When we introduce friction in this manner, we are placing obstacles in our people’s preparation and attendance to worship. Their minds can become distracted from the purpose of the gathering and thus, they become not fully present to God. Our task as the called leaders of the Church is reduce rather than increase any friction between God and His people. Must we do away with the coffee shop or the bookstore? No, they serve a purpose in the community of the church and the lives of the congregation. Perhaps we might consider closing them before and during the worship gathering and opening them afterwards to contribute to the fellowship and growth of the family of God. In doing so we accomplish two things. One, we establish the priority of the corporate worship event and practice in the life of the Christian and two, we make straight the path for the worshipper’s heart so that there is a frictionless path from the door to the altar. What do you think?

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Made to Stick by Chip & Dan Heath

We begin with a quiz:made2stk In the 1992 presidential campaign, a memorable proverb coined by James Carville entered the national consciousness. It was:

A. It’s the economy, stupid.

B. Change vs. more of the same.

C. Don’t forget healthcare.

The truth is, all three of these ideas were written by Mr. Carville on that famous white board as reminders to the Clinton campaign staff that these were important ideas to be communicated to the American voters. While the political process may not be of interest to many, what is instructive is to discover what makes one idea lodge in our memory while others refuse to stick? This is the question explored by Chip and Dan Heath in Made to Stick.

One of the greatest challenges that we face as agents of social change is that we must transfer our passion for the good of others into ideas that can resonate with people that we want to engage in the process. The Heaths analyze the process of communicating ideas and discover that those that cut through the avalanche of information that we encounter each day and wedge themselves permanently in our minds share six principles: Simplicity, Unexpectedness, Concreteness, Credibility, Emotions, and Stories. A memorable acronym emerges from these words – SUCCESs.

Made to Stick offers change agents a toolbox for analyzing and improving the way in which we convey our passionate call to action to others so that they become equally engaged and moved to action. For example, we may have attempted in the past to draw others to labor with us in the area of serving the homeless. We offer statistics to demonstrate that toiling in this field is not without a harvest as the cynical culture leads many to believe. The Heaths point out that the standard message is lacking in any of the adhesive qualities that would make our plea sticky and thus remain in the recipient’s consciousness, standing a better chance of catching fire.

They offer a story (S in the acronym) that cements the credibility (C as well) of our desire to engage others. Rather than telling others that a homeless rehabilitation program can be successful, followed by a graph and slide show, the Doe Fund in New York City sent a driver to pick up representatives of a grant organization. Rather than listening to the Doe executives on the ride from the airport, the grant representatives were enthralled by the story of their driver Dennis, a formerly homeless man who was a successful graduate of the work of the Doe program. The power of Unexpectedness, Credibility, Emotion, and Story combine to make the effectiveness of the Doe program stick in the mind far better than a presentation of the statistics can. The Heaths demonstrate that we can analyze all of our ideas in this way and find ways to integrate these principles in such a way as to make our ideas unforgettable.

Many primers on preaching and ministry leadership have attempted to convey this same idea but very few are as successful as Made to Stick. The brothers Heath have given us a book that succeeds at what it recommends; the illustrations and applications make each of the principles immediately memorable even apart from the easy to remember SUCCESs. Those of us involved in the work of social justice and change are often personally impassioned but can be frustrated when others that we hope to engage in our crusade fail to equally catch the fire. Using the SUCCESs principles to analyze the way in which we promote our passion can serve the kingdom well as we find those things that can cement the idea in the minds of fellow believers and move them action. After all, isn’t that what Jesus does in all the red words?

Bricks Without Straw

Ministry that is accompanied by struggle, persecution, and difficulty often leads the pastor to what where God’s plan lies. The Lord calls us to specific ministry objectives big and small and we faithfully follow that call only to discover that the ministry that results is fraught with heartache, disappointment, and struggle, sometimes even failure. I was reminded of this in reading Exodus this morning. Moses and Aaron are called to a ministry of confrontation with Pharaoh and leadership to their people. They carry the Lord’s message to him to release His people and, as a result, Pharaoh increases the pressure on the Hebrews.

The result is predictable, given what we know about human nature:

The Israelite foremen realized they were in trouble when they were told, “You are not to reduce the number of bricks required of you for each day.” When they left Pharaoh, they found Moses and Aaron waiting to meet them, and they said, “May the Lord look upon you and judge you! You have made us a stench to Pharaoh and his officials and have put a sword in their hand to kill us.”  Ex 5:19-21

Leaders in Christ’s church must be willing to remind God’s people that following His plan is a dangerous pursuit and there is always a chance that not all of us are going to come through unscathed. If God calls your church to a specific ministry, no matter how unglamorous, our calling is to lead our people into the fire regardless of the pain, scorn, and fallout that might come our way. To do anything less is to proclaim our lack of trust in the providence of our Father.

You see, we must continue to read on despite the fear of reprisal that a ministry call may generate. When Moses presses Yahweh for understanding, he gets this response:

“Therefore, say to the Israelites: ‘I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. I will free you from being slaves to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment. I will take you as my own people, and I will be your God. Then you will know that I am the Lord your God, who brought you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. And I will bring you to the land I swore with uplifted hand to give to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob. I will give it to you as a possession. I am the Lord.’ ” Ex 6:6-8

We, as followers of the Risen Christ, have the same great promise to undergird everything that the Father calls us to do. Every step of every day may be an incredible struggle as compared to others around us but, in the end, we have the promise of eternal life in the peace of the Lord. We can be faithful to our calling or we can avoid it, God gives us this choice but there is never a promise that either path will be easy.

Acts 13:48 An Exegetical Study

When the Gentiles heard this, they were glad and honored the word of the Lord; and all who were appointed for eternal life believed. (NIV)

Acts 13:48 is a verse that has drawn much attention both as a proof text in support of a theology (e.g. Steele, Thomas The Five Points of Calvinism pp 33, 35, 60; Calvin, The Institutes of the Christian Religion Book III Ch. 24) and more specifically, the doctrine of unconditional election. This verse is often pointed to as “the divine side of evangelism” (Bible Exposition Commentary), saying that one of the key words, variously translated as Ordained or Appointed, connotes those who are written in the Book of Life (Phil 4:3, etc.) and destined to everlasting life, saved from perdition.

This same verse which is said to emphasize God’s sovereignty in election and salvation is also many times is seen as a mandate to evangelization so as to draw people to our Savior. Greg Laurie (Growing Your Church Through Evangelism and Outreach pp. 139), for example, says that by evangelism people must be persuaded to come to the work of the Spirit. Sometimes, he points out, two invitations are necessary in order to give people an opportunity to make a choice for Christ.

In the debate of continuous interest–Calvin versus Arminius–this same verse is said support both the monergistic and synergistic points of view. The Calvinist reads it as a declaration of the election of certain of humankind to salvation and the Arminian agrees. Those who interpret scripture through the Arminian-Wesleyian framework say yes, individuals are appointed for life eternal and that this appointment is made by God but, contrary to the Calvinist position, this gift must be received by a man or woman in order to be effectual.

Can this Word of God be rightly divided in such a way that it means everything that is attributed to it? Or, when placed back into its larger context and read in its original Greek form, does it lean heavily to one side or the other. The purpose of this study will be to help you decide the meaning of this verse and how it affects our reading of other verses and passages in God’s revelation to us. Though you may be tempted to read this simply to find affirmation of your particular theological framework, I urge you to approach this (and the study of all Scripture) prayerfully and with a heart open to movement and guidance of the Holy Spirit.

The Lukan Corpus

Proof-texting can be a disingenuous practice if the verse or passage that one chooses to utilize as support for a specific doctrine or practice has a different meaning when it is extracted from the larger context in which it was written. In order to properly evaluate a section of Scripture, it is critical that we locate that section within its surrounding material. Examining Acts 13:48 then requires us to look at the verse in the context of its immediate pericope, Luke’s description of Paul and Barnabas’ ministry in Pisidian Antioch, then the entire book of Acts and finally, the corpus of Luke’s writing, the Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles.

If we read Luke/Acts with the common focus of its historicity it is easy to miss the emphasis that the author places on the way of salvation and the work of the Holy Spirit. The progress (cf. Liefeld, Interpreting the Book of Acts, pp 41-42) of the gospel is recorded in a series of summary verses:

Acts 2:41 Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day.

Acts 2:47 praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.

Acts 4:4 But many who heard the message believed, and the number of men grew to about five thousand.

Acts 5:14 Nevertheless, more and more men and women believed in the Lord and were added to their number.

Acts 6:7 So the word of God spread. The number of disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly, and a large number of priests became obedient to the faith.

Acts 9:31 Then the church throughout Judea, Galilee and Samaria enjoyed a time of peace. It was strengthened; and encouraged by the Holy Spirit, it grew in numbers, living in the fear of the Lord.

Acts 9:42 This became known all over Joppa, and many people believed in the Lord.

Acts 11:21 The Lord’s hand was with them, and a great number of people believed and turned to the Lord.

Acts 12:24 But the word of God continued to increase and spread.

Acts 13:48 When the Gentiles heard this, they were glad and honored the word of the Lord; and all who were appointed for eternal life believed.

Acts 16:5 So the churches were strengthened in the faith and grew daily in numbers.

Acts 19:20 In this way the word of the Lord spread widely and grew in power.

Acts 28:31 Boldly and without hindrance he preached the kingdom of God and taught about the Lord Jesus Christ.

Salvation is a major theme in both Luke and Acts (Marshall, Luke: Historian and Theologian). In Luke, the verb “save” appears some seventeen times and thirteen times in Acts. “Savior” appears twice in each book and “salvation” shows up seven times in Acts (cf. soteria in 13:47-48) and two Greek words for “salvation” appear six times in Luke. In Luke the emphasis is appropriately placed on Jesus as the one who brought (was) God’s salvation. The focus in Acts is the extent of this salvation, open to all classes  of people — Gentiles, sinners, and the disenfranchised across all supposed geographic boundaries. Many Jews believed but the gospel did not end there; it went afar into the Gentile world where it was gladly received. Intertwined with these themes we find the related word “grace” in its theological sense of God’s work in an individual.

Liefeld (ibid. pp 93) suggests a further theme that runs through the twin volumes that is easily overlooked, the sovereignty of God and divine necessity. Necessity is defined as “what must be done to complete God’s sovereign plan.” Luke’s use of the word dei (“it is necessary”, “it must”) is frequent enough to warrant notice of a thread of divine intention running through the books. God is at the foundation of the kerygmatic impulse that propels Acts that finds two matching ideas that should not be separated: divine providence and the summons to obedience. As Fernando says (Fernando, NIVAC:Acts, pp 343) “Those who do seek after God , then, do not do so entirely by their own efforts but by the enlightening of their minds and the energizing of their wills by the Holy Spirit.” An example of these ideas is seen in the conversion of Lydia where the gospel message  is first presented to this successful woman and God then “opened here heart to respond to Paul’s message. (Acts 16:14).” An evangelistic principle is extracted from the Lukan examples. There is an interplay between human initiative and divine quickening which leads us to understand our responsibility and emphasizes that it is God who ultimately gives the results (ibid. pp 451) [cf. vv 26:18, 29].

Context Within Acts

It is generally recognized that Acts divides into two parts; the first (Chs 1 to 12) half having to do with Peter and the beginnings of the Church within the Holy Land and the second (Chs 13 to 28), with Paul and the movement of the gospel from Antioch to Rome. Recording Paul’s missionary journeys, the verse of interest occurs within the context of his first missionary adventure. To outline the immediate context of chapter 13 we can utilize clear breaks in the movement of narrative as our guide.

  1. Vv 1 to 3 – Paul and Barnabas are commissioned and sent
  2. Vv 4 to 12 – Ministry on Cyprus
  3. Vv 13 to 52 – Ministry in Pisidian Antioch
    1. vv 13 – 41 : Preaching Ministry
    2. vv 42 – 52 : The Effect of Paul’s Sermon

The nearest context of interest in this narrative locates Paul and his companions ministering in Pisidian Antioch. On the Sabbath they enter the synagogue and await the movement of the Spirit. They don’t wait long as the synagogue leadership asks them to share a “message of encouragement.” (v 15) Paul delivers much more than they bargained for. He rehearses the history of God’s dealings with Israel and now His movement to the Gentiles leading up the death and resurrection of the Savior Christ. Paul proclaims the good news that forgiveness of sins through Jesus is available to “everyone who believes.” (v 39) The power of the gospel message and dire warning that Paul issues at the close garners him a second invitation to preach on the next Sabbath.

Paul returns to the synagogue to find nearly the entire population of the city gathered to “hear hear the word of the Lord.” (v 44) This surge in attendance did not sit well with the Jews who abused Paul and the gospel message that he delivers. Paul, never one to cower in the face of a challenge, speaks “boldly” (v 46) pointing out that the Jews were the first to receive the revelation of the justification available through Jesus but, he continues “since you reject it and do not consider yourselves worthy of eternal life” (v46) Paul is guided to take the message to a new people. When the Gentiles hear their place in God’s plan “they were glad and honored the word of the Lord;” resulting in their belief. This movement of the Spirit caused a stir in the whole region resulting in further abuse by the Jews driving Paul’s band on to Iconium. “The disciples were filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit.” (v52)

A careful reading of the verse being examined finds that it is a necessary counterbalance to the emphasis on human will and choice that precedes it in the passage. It does not abrogate the previous references but reinforces the the divine imperative that regenerates the human soul and makes repentance and belief possible. “All those who believed “were appointed for eternal life” It is never merely a person’s own choice that saves them, it is always God’s love and mercy.” (Fernando, NIVAC) Williams has a similar view of the verse (NIBC) “The idea of appointment in this verse is not meant in a restrictive sense. The thought is not of God limiting salvation to the few, but of extending it to the many, in contrast to the exclusiveness of the Jews. And of course this divine choice did not obviate the need for personal faith.”

Word Study

Irving Jensen has said, “Just as a great door swings on small hinges, so the important theological statements of the Bible often depend upon even the smallest words, such as preposition and articles.” (Jensen, Enjoy Your Bible) A single word is often at the center of the life giving doctrines of the Bible and, in order to understand them, we must study the specific words in their original context. We begin then by examining Acts 13:48 in its Greek form:

Acts 13:48 akouonta de ta.eqnh ecairon kai. edoxazon ton logon tou/ kuriou kai.episteusan osoi hsan tetagmenoi eij zwhn aiwnion\

Translated:

akouonta de ta.eqnh ecairon

And hearing            the nations      rejoiced

kai. edoxazon    ton logon tou/ kuriou

and  glorified [honored]       the word           of the     Lord

kai.episteusan osoi    hsan

and        believed           as many as       were

tetagmenoi      eij  zwhn  aiwnion\

having been disposed        to  life                   eternal

The word of most interest to this discussion is tetagmenoi (tetagmenoi), a form of the verb tassw (tasso). Before parsing the verb, let’s establish the root definition. [Highlighted phrases and sentences added to point to references of the verse being examined.]

Theological Dictionary of the New Testament – Gerhard Kittel

The basic definition of this word means to appoint, to order, with such nuances as to arrange, to determine, to set in place, to establish, and (in the middle form) to fix for oneself.

LXX: senses are to appoint, to prohibit, to ordain, to set, to draw up, and middle to command, to make disposition, to fix, to turn one’s gaze, to set one’s heart, and to make.

NT: in Acts 15:2 – to determine / Acts 28:23 to appoint / Mt 28:16 to order. Christians are ordained to eternal life in Acts 13:48; conferring of status rather than foreordination is the point.

The NIV Theological Dictionary of New Testament Words – Verlyn D. Verbrugge

tasso – Arrange, appoint / protasso – command, appoint / diatasso – command, order / diatage – ordinance, direction / epitasso – command, order / epitage – order, injunction

This word is common in classical Greek. Its first meaning is military: draw up troops (or ships) in battle array. From this verb it came to mean direct or a appoint someone to a task, arrange, setup , put things or plans in order. All these verbs and nouns imply an acknowledged authority and power residing in the person from whom decisions or directives issue.

In the LXX the words in this word group are used with both God and humans as the arranging or directing agents.

NT: tasso is used 8 times and means some order or arrangement that has been made. It denotes God’s appointment of the “authorities that exist” (Rom 13:1), of Paul’s career assignment (Acts 22:10) and of individual persons’ “appointed” for eternal life through believing the gospel (Acts 13:48). In the middle Voice it means to make a mutual arrangement [Taxamenoi] (Acts 28:23)

Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament: Based on Semantic Domains – J.P. Louw & E.Nida

37.96 τάσσωa; ὁρίζωb; ἀναδείκνυμιb; τίθημιb: to assign someone to a particular task, function, or role—‘to appoint, to designate, to assign, to give a task to.’

τάσσωa : ἐπίστευσαν ὅσοι ἦσαν τεταγμένοι εἰς ζωὴν αἰώνιον ‘those who had been designated for eternal life became believers’ Ac 13.48. Though τάσσω in Ac 13.48 has sometimes been interpreted as meaning ‘to choose,’ there seems to be far more involved than merely a matter of selection, since a relationship is specifically assigned.

ὁρίζωb : ὁ ὡρισμένος ὑπὸ τοῦ θεοῦ κριτής ‘the one designated by God as judge’ Ac 10.42.

ἀναδείκνυμιb : ἀνέδειξεν ὁ κύριος ἑτέρους ἑβδομήκοντα δύο ‘the Lord appointed another seventy-two men’ Lk 10.1.

τίθημιb: ἔθηκα ὑμᾶς ἵνα ὑμεῖς ὑπάγητε καὶ καρπὸν φέρητε ‘I appointed you to go and bear much fruit’ Jn 15.16.

A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and other Early Christian Literature – Frederick Danker / Walter Bauer

  1. To bring about an order of things by arranging, arrange, put in place
    1. Of an authority structure passive
    2. Of a person: Put into a specific position, used with a preposition. (in the passive, belong to, be classed among those possessing) (Acts 13:48) Mt 8:9 Lk 7:8 1 Cor 16:15

When we parse the verb, we discover that it can be read in two forms. This is because “in the present tense, the middle and passive forms of the verb are identical” (Mounce, Basics of Biblical Greek). Accordingly, many lexicons and other language tools will show two parsings side by side:

1. participle perfect passive nominative masculine plural

2. participle perfect middle nominative masculine plural

A little grammar to begin that you can skip if Greek is second nature to you. A participle (in English and Greek, a verbal adjective) has the characteristics of both a verb and an adjective. It has a tense (present, aorist, perfect) and a voice (active, middle, passive) like a verb and as an adjective it agrees with the word that it modifies in case, number, and gender. The tense describes the type of action denoted:

  • present – describes a continuous action
  • aorist – presents an undefined action – the participle describes the action without commenting on the nature of the action
  • perfect – describes a completed action with present effects

The voice refers to the relationship between the subject and the verb.

  • active – the subject does the action of the verb – Bob threw the ball. Threw is active because Bill did it.
  • passive – the subject receives the action of the verb – Bob was hit by the ball. Was hit is passive because Bill was hit.
  • middle – the action of the verb in some way affects the subject – The closest we can come with Bob and the ball is Bob hits himself with the ball.

It is an important footnote to this discussion to note that Luke is aware of and uses a variety of Greek words having the same meaning as the verb in question (appointed, ordained). See his usage in Luke 2:23, 10:1 and Acts 3:20, 6:3, 10:42, 12:21, 14:23, 15:12, 17:31, 22:10, 22:14, 26:16 & 28:23.

[Note that the discussion of middle versus passive voice is also a component of the Cessationist debate over the spiritual gift of tongues. The verb that Paul selects is pausontai which can also be parsed in the middle or passive voice. In 1 Cor 13:8, the verse can be read to indicate that the gift of tongues will cease or the gift of tongues will cease in and of itself.]

Conclusion

As I stated at the outset, the purpose of this study is not to present to you a conclusive reading of this important verse. What I have done is survey the scholarship and presented my findings to you in an orderly manner so that you can prayerfully decide what the appropriate reading and application of this verse is. Do not allow your theology to be determined solely on the word of others and a proof-text list. God has provided his revelation so that each of us can determine, given the entire scope of Scripture, the appropriate rendering of his Word and the aspects of His character and action that each reveals. Proof-texting that inappropriately “helicopters” in (as my beloved Dr. Carroll used to say) and pulls a verse out of its surrounding context is an incorrect way of dividing the Holy Word.

God bless you all in your study.

Update:

A fine analysis of this passage by William Birch can be found here.

Gracism and Honor for the Honorless

At the midway point in David Anderson’s examination of 1 Corinthians 12, our eyes should be opening to the reality of being a part of the Body. Gracism offers us an antidote to the individuality and exclusion that threads its way through the the Church, separating us as though we are unconnected  or needful of what other brothers and sisters have to offer. By allowing this to continue, we run the risk of planting barriers that make it much more difficult for us to fulfill our Divinely-assigned work. To this point, Anderson has summarized the complex chapter into the following Gracist affirmations:

  • I will lift you up
  • I will cover you
  • I will share with you

and today, we will take a quick look at the fourth saying I will Honor you.

An important component of the Gracist mindset comes from a refusal to allow dishonor to visited upon any member of the body. Our human tendency to assign degrees of honor to other people runs contra to the biblical notions of equality within the body. Though we may achieve different stations in life and enjoy various successes and failures, in the eyes of God — the one who matters — we are all simply sinners in need of His grace. Paul wrote to the Corinthians that this same graceful vision should be shared among the brothers and sisters of the body.

David teaches us to train our eyes to look out within the Body and extending to all people for those are “honor deficient.” These are people who do not have what the majority enjoy. It may be access to services, it may equal treatment, it could be nearly invisible things that we often take for granted but for some, it becomes a wedge of separation that should never exist within the Body of Christ. The solution for the Gracist is to seek these folks out and honor them. It becomes our job to “invite them to the banquet.” We can be the uniters within the Body, seeking out those whose honor is dirtied or being blocked and find ways of restoring that God given honor to them and bringing them back into the purpose of the Body.

Pastor Anderson offers a simple reminder of our common state before God whose eyes do not divide:

The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in love.

He will not always accuse, nor will he harbor his anger forever;

He does not treat us as our sins deserve, or repay us according to our iniquities.

(Psalm 103 8-10)