Killing Christians: Living Faith Where It's Not Safe to Believe

Tom Doyle, a DTS grad and Dallas resident, recently published Killing Christians. When I saw my physician for annual check-up, she was reading it on her phone and raved about it. Here's a quick review from Dan Wooding, whom I met on a press junket to Israel in 2009. He is the founder of the ASSIST News Service.Killing Christians: Living the Faith Where It's Not Safe to Believe (Book Review)NASHVILLE, TN. (ANS – September 6, 2015) - Forty Egyptian churches burned to the ground. House church leaders sentenced to Iran's infamous Evin prison. Eighty Christians murdered in North Korea for merely owning a Bible. Believers nailed to crosses in Syria. And that was the news for just one month in 2014. The terror has continued into 2015 to unimaginable heights.Widespread persecution can't stop the faithful who spread Jesus' love in the face of grave danger. Check out the news, and note the places where war, poverty, racism, seething religious violence, and killing seem to own the day. Right in the middle of it all, Jesus' church is thriving.In Killing Christians: Living the Faith Where It's Not Safe to Believe (W Publishing Group), Middle East director for e3 Partners Tom Doyle (with the help of Greg Webster), shares the personal stories of persecuted Christians, many of whom pay the ultimate price for their faith. From secret meetings to torture rooms, Doyle brings readers eight unique stories from the front lines with never-before-heard testimony of those Christians being targeted.“There is remarkable freedom in having no expectations, no plans for tomorrow,” says Farid Assad of Syria. “The question I and many others start every day with is this: ‘Jesus, what do You have planned for me and my family?’ Only today matters. Only how I live for Jesus counts. Everything else is superficial. When I hand over my life to my Lord, knowing each day may be my last one on this earth, I am more at peace than ever before.”Tom Doyle pastored churches in Colorado, Texas, and New Mexico for twenty years before becoming a missionary in the Middle East. His passion for Israel was fed through guiding tours there, eventually becoming a tour guide for the State of Israel. Tom also serves as the Middle East director of e3 Partners (http://e3partners.org), a global church planting ministry. He is the author of three books, Breakthrough, Two Nations Under God, and Dreams and Visions. He and his wife, JoAnn, have six children and two grandchildren.    

Domestic Abuse and the Church: 7 Ways to Help

Kathryn* was a close friend. We met at church and spent hours ministering together. But she seemed guarded whenever the subject of her marriage came up. My husband and I knew her husband; we attended church together. And we sometimes shared meals with them. He baked me a cake once when I miscarried—he could be so kind. But he also sometimes made lewd comments that made me wonder if he had a porn addiction. Eventually Kathryn confided that her husband often raged at her and spewed abusive speech, and that he had dragged her across the room by her hair. Another time, he barred the door to keep her from leaving.When Kathryn got pregnant with their second child, the abuse escalated. (One in six abused women reports that her partner first abused her during pregnancy, and according to the CDC, at least 4 to 8 percent of pregnant women report suffering abuse during pregnancy.) Afterward, he would apologize and beg forgiveness, but then he would repeat his actions a few days later.After the baby was born, my friend took refuge with her children in our home. And her husband kicked in our door to get to them. She went to an attorney to request a restraining order, and she learned that she could not get one in our state unless she filed for divorce. So she filed only to protect herself. But some church elders threatened discipline. They reasoned, “The husband says he is sorry, and the wife files for divorce. She must be the one in the wrong.” When she wrote them a letter explaining that she wanted what was best for him, they would not read it. Their reasoning: they did not want to know intimate details about this couple.A decade later another close friend, with a husband in church leadership, was my workout buddy. One day when walking next to her on the treadmill, I noticed a nasty bruise on her arm. When I asked her about it, she looked terrified.“Did your husband do that?” I probed.She nodded.In this case, the elders (at a different church) told him to clean up his act or leave the church. He promised the former, but he chose the latter.Every year in the US, more than 4 million women experience physical assault and rape by their partners. One in three female homicide victims are murdered by their current or a former partner. Young women, ages 18 to 34, are at greatest risk.And it’s not happening only outside the church. Domestic violence is rampant in our churches, yet we rarely talk about it. Many people who pass themselves off as good Christians seek to establish power and control over another person through fear and intimidation, often including the threat or use of violence. In doing so, the abuser betrays the trust that should be inherent in such a close relationship. And he or she has a mentality of entitlement that says, “I’m justified in using evil tactics to obtain and maintain power and control.”According to domesticviolence.org, most victims are women (one in four will experience it in her lifetime). But men can be victims, too. And it is worth noting that children in homes where domestic violence happens are more likely to experience abuse and/or neglect, as well (30–60%). Most children in such homes know about the violence. And even if a parent never physically harms them, they suffer emotional harm and experience behavior problems from witnessing it.The abuse is most likely to happen between 6 PM till 6 AM. And it usually happens at home, though 40% of the time, it takes place elsewhere. Sometimes, but not always, it involves alcohol. In both of the cases described above, there was no alcohol involved.For victims who leave, the result can be homelessness. According to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, about 1/3 of families in shelters are there due to domestic violence. But many choose to stay in the abusive situation. And most incidents go unreported.So how can we and our churches help?1. Go public. Speak out in public against domestic violence, and encourage pastors to preach on the subject. Periodically include in your church bulletin a domestic abuse hotline phone number as well as contact information for a church member trained to help in cases of abuse.2. Teach accurately. Verses interpreted as teaching that a good wife must always bring only honor to her husband (e.g., Prov. 31:12) can keep victims trapped in silence. And misguided teaching about males leading and wives submitting, especially when such teaching presents “lead” as the husband’s verb instead of agape “love” (Eph. 5:25) can reinforce the entitlement mentality. Some reports say abuse is actually higher in traditional churches than in the population at large.3. Use your words to bless. The abused person is probably beat down emotionally and mentally, and the lies he or she has heard can creep into the thinking process. Expect victims to have a lot of self-doubt and be paralyzed by fear. The abuser usually wages a mental war that leaves the victim cowering both physically and emotionally. So speak truth. Remind victims of God’s love and their value. Pray with and for them. Promise confidentiality and keep your word. When possible, lead both victim and abuser to get wise counsel.4. For the sake of safety, allow divorce as an option. Divorce is not ideal in a healthy relationship—Jesus pointed to the beginning as the ideal. But when hardness of heart makes living unsafe (Mark 10:5), whether emotionally or physically, we do not help victims by making divorce itself the enemy. The marriage is destroyed by the abuse, not the legal document that comes as a result of the abuse. That is not to say divorce is the first course of action; but often a no-divorce policy ends up further victimizing the victims who feel they have no choice but to file.5. Most instances of abuse go unreported, so suggest notifying authorities. Encourage the victim to photograph any physical evidence, and report the crime to police. But in the process, avoid giving the impression that only physical abuse counts. Emotional abuse is every bit as damaging.6. Believe that abusers can change. Abusers are among the captives whom Jesus came to set free (Luke 4:18). Still, have realistic expectations. Most abusers choose not to repent.7. Encourage victims that they are under no obligation to stick around till change happens. Nor are they responsible for making change happen.Proverbs 31:8–9 says to speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves. Part of doing justice, loving mercy, and walking humbly with our God (Micah 6:8) is standing up for those beat down by abuse. The church should be known as a refuge for victims, not a shield for the voilent-tempered or manipulative. With God's help, those of us with influence in the church can help make Christ's Body a place where the helpless run for solace and find they are finally safe.*Not her real name.

I Wish My Church Knew...

Recently Her.meneutics asked people to enter a summer writing contest addressing what they wished their church knew. More than 150 women with ages ranging from 16 to 70+ responded from across the world. Here is the list of topics they submitted. "I wish my church knew . . ."the pain of miscarriagethe importance of female pastors as role modelsthat we don't have all the answersthat singles need ministry toothat we can learn something from the LGBT communitythe demands of women who workthe pervasiveness of mental illnessto teach us how to arguethe forgotten power of reciting the psalmsto stop looking for the next big thingthe needs of rural womenwhat it's like to be an evangelical introverthow to talk about addictionthe ministry opportunities for adults with disabilitieshow to make disciples out of senior citizenswhat it's really like to be a pastor's kidthe pain of domestic violence victimsthe effectiveness of intergenerational ministryto value preschoolers for their sake, not to reach their parentsthe struggles of chronic illnessthe practice of healing confessionwhat it's like to walk into a barthe dangers of being middle classhow many of us are dealing with depressionthat Christians don't need to mourn the loss of Christian Americathat worship isn't about usthat I love the church just the way it isthe place for stillness in the churchnot to pretend to be perfecthow to feel like familyThe editor wrote, "Some of these topics came up over and over again, especially ones related to mental illness, singleness, and introversion. The church isn't just for happy and healthy married extroverts. . . . "Here is one of the first essays, which comes from a single mom.How would you answer the question? 

How to Host a Bible Study

More to Life magazine recently featured my advice on how to start a home Bible study. You can find it on page 18. 

On Beauty, The Senses, and Science

On Saturday, I organized some stacks of papers started before I got my PhD. The deadline has passed for blaming it on the busyness of school (I graduated in 2013!). In the stack I found some quotes I had saved that are worth sharing. . . .C. S. Lewis in Mere Christianity:There is no need to be worried by facetious people who try to make the hope of “Heaven” ridiculous by saying they do not want “to spend eternity playing harps.” All the scriptural imagery (harps, crowns, gold, etc.) is, of course, a merely symbolical attempt to express the inexpressible. People who take these symbols literally might as well think that when Christ told us to be like doves, he meant that we were to lay eggs.C. S. Lewis in Transposition and Other Addresses:How far the life of the risen [human] will be sensory, we do not now. But I surmise that it will differ from the sensory life we know here . . . as a flower differs from the bulb or a cathedral from an architect’s drawing.We do not want merely to see beauty. We want something else which can hardly be put into words—to be united with the beauty we see, to pass into it, to receive it into ourselves, to bathe in it, to become a part of it. If we take the imagery of Scripture seriously . . . we believe that God will one day give us the Morning Star and cause us to put on the splendour of the sun. We cannot mingle [now] with the splendours we see. But all the leaves of the New Testament are rustling with the rumour that it will not always be so.C. S. Lewis in God in the Dock:The angels…have no senses; their experience is purely intellectual and spiritual. That is why we know something about God which they don’t. There are particular aspects of His love and joy which can be communicated to a created being only by sensuous experience. Something of God which the Seraphim can never quite understand flows into us from the blue of the sky, the taste of honey, the delicious embrace of water whether cold or hot, and even from sleep itself.David Sayre in Something There Is:Many who have devoted their lives to science testify to their sense of awe at the great beauty that lies at the heart of nature. . . . The experiences of order, of symmetry, of finding deep and hidden relationships, of consistent metaphors and analogies—all are deeply scientific, as well as beautiful.

A Little Nuancing on Defunding Planned Parenthood

Rachel Held Evans raised some good questions:

"Anyone else caught in this tension?: I'm pro-life in the sense that I believe life begins in the womb [I would say "at fertilization"] and is worth protecting even before birth. However, 9 times out of 10, I find myself totally disagreeing with the pro-life movement's methods for protecting that life.

“For example, completely defunding Planned Parenthood with no plan to replace its other services (like offering affordable contraception, gynecological services, and prenatal care to underprivileged women), could actually lead to more abortions. Teaching abstinence-only education in public schools appears to be less effective than comprehensive sex-education at reducing the teen pregnancy rate. Simply voting for Republicans who want to make abortion illegal (even though they are very unlikely to do so and even though criminalizing abortion won't stop it from happening) without considering how other conservative social policies affect women most at risk for having abortions seems like an exercise in futility.

“And opposing coverage for contraception in insurance policies seems like a great way to increase rather than decrease unwanted pregnancies."

When Dr. Bill and I were coauthoring our book on contraception for the Christian Medical Association, some Christians opposed our talk of methods that did not risk human life. These people wanted us to speak only about abstinence and natural family planning (NFP). 

BTW, according to the "2014 State of Dating in America" report published by Christian Mingle, 61% of Christians said they would have sex before marriage. And fifty-six percent said that it's appropriate to move in with someone after dating for a time between six months and two years.

My husband and I abstained till marriage. I'm all for that, believe me. But if most or even many Christians aren't abstaining, how realistic is it to go with abstinence-only teaching in the broader culture? The folks who considered us liberal wanted us to avoid any talk of family planning other than NFP—which we argued is pretty unnatural in that it interrupts sexual fulfillment at the time of the month wives are physically most interested, and for some wives the only time they are interested.

Contraception prevents abortions. We saw that in Russia when women could not get access to contraception, so they used abortion as their chosen method. We met women who'd had five, six, seven, eight abortions.... The married Christians there begged us to bring them contraceptives.

Today, where are the Christians offering alternatives to abortion beyond abstinence and NFP? It's not enough to offer Pregnancy Resource Centers that leave contraception out of the mix. If we are truly against abortion, where is our plan to really prevent them? If we don't care about making contraception affordable and accessible, perhaps we are blinded by our own middle- and upper-class comfort that knows nothing of working three jobs to put food on the table.

About Cecil the Lion vs. abortion

To my friends criticizing the attention given to a lion when babies are being killed: I agree we need a change of heart. I agree that human life is infinitely precious. But I suggest that rather than criticizing the outrage over the lion, which is appropriate (the OT sacrificial system was still concerned with being humane to animals), we should affirm that outrage and think of it as common ground to talk about the preciousness of all life God creates. The apostle Paul looked at the altars in Athens and saw something good in them rather than condemning the Athenians for believing in false gods. He found the good impulse that he had in common with them (they worshiped an unseen god) and capitalized on it.

Marriage podcast: Part 2

In this episode, I talk about my own marriage and the difficulties we have faced, as well as how we handled these problems. I discuss the theological bases of marriages and how everyone’s belief can be skewed at times.You’ll Discover:The true goal and purpose of a marriageThe essential ingredients that help throughout the changing “seasons” of lifeThe number one sex problem  

What I Watched

This was my first time to fly through Dubai. The UAE is committing to having the best airport in the world. And they are making progress. They want to be the greatest at other stuff, too. I saw the tallest building in the world out the window through the haze.The Emirates airplanes are nicer than US ones, with more legroom. And wifi. But here's the rub: instead of flying eight hours to London and another eight to Nairobi, I flew fifteen hours from Dallas to Dubai and five more to Nairobi.So in the past week, I spent a total of 40 hours on Emirates flights. In addition to sleep, what did I do? I lacked a computer cord on the return, because one of the nationals needed it. So I binge-watched a lot of personal-screen TV. Here is the rundown on my selections with brief comments:Big Bang Theory reruns – Great for passing the half hour that might include ten interruptions from the captain about takeoff or landing. Fun and mindless for passing time, and no problem if you miss a scene or two. (I had been told to watch Breaking Bad, but that was not offered as an option.)Kidnapping Mr. Heineken – The inside story of the planning, execution, aftermath and downfall of the kidnappers of beer tycoon Alfred "Freddy" Heineken. The crime resulted in the largest ransom ever paid for an individual. Anthony Hopkins stars as the victim. Decent suspense. But depressing.Birdman – Starring Michael Keaton. It won the Oscar for Best Picture. How bad could it be? Uh…that bad. What was I thinking?Woman in Gold – A British-American drama starring Helen Mirren. It’s based on the true story of an elderly Jewish refugee living in Los Angeles, who, with her lawyer, fought the government of Austria for nearly a decade. Her goal: to reclaim Gustav Klimt's iconic painting of her aunt, Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I. The Nazis stole the work from the Altmann's relatives in Vienna prior to World War II. She took her legal battle all the way to the US Supreme Court. As for the film, some of the script was weak, but the plot was terrific, and Mirren is always great.A Little Chaos – A 2014 British period drama directed by and starring Alan Rickman. Also starring Kate Winslet. Two talented landscape artists fall in love while building a garden in King Louis XIV's Versailles palace. The plot is a bit far-fetched. But what the heck. It was fun to see Rickman sporting a big ol’ French longhaired wig.Downton Abbey – Final season. Best use of my time. Binge-watching nine hours of DA with no cell or email interruptions + a few hours’ sleep = shortest fifteen-hour flight ever. Too bad I didn't save any episodes for the Dubai/Dallas leg of the trip (longest flight ever).

My Kenya Trip Report

I just returned from spending a week in Kenya—my first trip back since 2008. My husband, Gary, serves as East Africa field director for East-West Ministries, so he goes three to four times per year.There were six of us this time. Gary and me; an East-West (E-W) writer and her stand-up-comedy-guy husband; the E-W VP of development; and a photographer/ videographer.Gary had asked if we wanted to all pay extra and do a trip to the Maasai Mara while getting over jet lag. Because he has been to Kenya so many times, he knew exactly the place to stay that was cheap. And everybody said yes.We stayed in two-bed tents w/ concrete bathrooms attached. Generators pumped in power from 6 AM till 10 PM. So the stars twinkled against an obsidian background. And coyotes howled. One does not leave one's tent after the generators go off!We did a drive through the Mara at 4 PM till dark when we got there, and then up early to get to the gate by 7 AM for the good sunlight. We saw the Big Five—the five most aggressive animals when hunted, which are the rhino, African elephant, lion, African buffalo (water buffalo), and leopard. Seeing all five is quite a coup! The leopard was in a tree eating zebra.We saw lots of lions. Two were mating. My photos of that are still in Gary's suitcase (and he is not yet back). But here is a shot of two lions in a field w/ a harvester (top) who had no clue.Back to Nairobi (4.5-hour drive). Next day we flew to Kitale in W. Kenya, near the border of Uganda. The first day in Kitale, we interviewed kids in the E-W child sponsorship program. I'm happy to say not one of them is in an orphanage, because the program finds their nearest kin and offers support for school, food, and hygiene within the family context, rather than an institution. Administration happens at a local level via the Adopt-a-Legacy International Ministries (ALIM) board. Gary serves this board via administrative support (e.g., spreadsheets), counsel, and fund-raising. And they decide how to distribute the limited funds available.Pastors and other church members take in the totally destitute kids, and these families, when possible, receive funds for school, food, and hygiene help when we can find it. At minimum, the kids get schooling paid for (public school in Kenya is not free). Our kids' uniforms were tattered and definitely the cast-offs from other kids. But the ALIM children are getting an education. (Christianity Today ran a story about how best to invest humanitarian funds, and child sponsorship topped the list.)We heard heartbreaking stories from our kids. Like Caleb, whose house was robbed. The thieves hit his dad on the head and gang-raped his mother. He and his brother found their mother, Pamela, in the field and brought her back. The father cannot work due to injuries. We were able to film Pamela telling her story and emphasizing how important sponsors are to their family and what it means to her children's futures.Then there was Aimee. She lost both parents to AIDS. Her grandmother is raising her. We filmed her grandmother pleading, saying that when she dies, Aimee has nothing...except sponsors, who will make it possible for Aimee to have a life.I know our child sponsorship program is important, but putting faces and stories with the kids reminded me just how much!The next day we drove up Mt. Elgon with an entourage of two jeeps full of white people and three motorcycles. Obama was in Nairobi, and I think some folks thought we were his detail. (The whole country was abuzz with his arrival. They love him in Kenya. We asked why. They said because his family is Kenyan and because they hope the US will bring some security to the border of Somalia in the northeast part of the country.)E-W provided three motorcycles to people who were already walking long distances to minister/share the gospel. That is, the recipients are people who were already sacrificing to do what they needed to do (rather than people with goals/plans that they might begin to accomplish if only they could get a motorcycle). One such person is Rose. She is from a little-known tribe whose members live in the forest. So she was walking long distances in and out of the forest to share the gospel, and she planted several house churches. So E-W gave her a motorcycle. She was part of the motorcycle crew that accompanied us the entire two days we were on the mountain. I'm not sure exactly where she slept....Another recipient is a pastor named Daniel, who has done the same in another remote area. His wife, Alice, thanked me for the vehicle (not that I had a thing to do with it!), because she used to have to get her kids up super early to walk to the church's meeting place, spending half her day walking to/from it with them. Now the whole family gets on the bike and gets around quickly. So they can spend time ministering to people rather than traveling. Alice served us dinner in her home (photo below).Irene (photo below) joined us for the entire time on Mt. Elgon as well. She graduated from high school, and she wants to go to college to be an accountant. But she had to drop out after one semester because she and her parents lacked funds. Her parents are working to pay for her siblings' high school education (as mentioned, public education in Kenya is not free), and they have nothing left for Irene. She asked me to sponsor her. I told her we have 49 kids in the program, and only four are fully sponsored right now. So we can't add any more. I hated telling her that! Hopefully the video team will help us raise more funds.The next day we visited the third house church, Rabbit Church–so called because they are committed to multiplying like rabbits, rather than elephants. That is, members don't wait till they reach a certain level of formal training before sharing the gospel.I ended up being the main guest speaker at each house church, speaking out of John 4 about the woman who ran to tell everyone she had met Christ within minutes after doing so. Little did I know that is the main story used in their training. So they cheered for me. Ha! One of the homes was that of Gladys, who was the first woman to perform a baptism on Mt. Elgon. We are committed to gender equality in this work from the start. And it is a beautiful thing to behold.At Rabbit Church, we witnessed three young men being baptized. The people told me that their standards of living have improved since becoming Christians, because they now belong to a community where everyone helps each other. One woman told of how funds were provided for her husband's medical treatment (he died of throat cancer) in an area where no one typically sees a doctor. People were living out, "Behold, how they love one another."The next morning, we flew back to Nairobi. I left the group to go back to Dallas via Dubai while they went on to Turkana country, which looks desolate as the moon. Many are trusting Christ among the Turkana. Gary had been training James, one of the ALIM board members in Kitale. James had left Turkana land and received an education, and he told Gary that he (Gary) needed to go share the gospel w/ the Turkana and he (James) would translate. Gary told James that he (James) needed to share the gospel, but Gary would go with him. So that is what happened, and it was the beginning of a movement. In Gary's last episode in Turkana, he witnessed a big baptism ceremony held in a camel-watering hole.Today the team is back in Nairobi and going on to Ethiopia, where the crew hopes to film the water well project we're involved with. One group of Turkana gave Gary a goat and a chicken yesterday, which he gave to the next church he visited. I can just see him trying to get those through US Customs!I'm back answering emails and trying to get over jet lag. Alexandra flies back tonight from Baltimore, where she has been staying with our niece.Please pray for the team, and for the ongoing effects of this work. Thank you! And for readers who support us and/or sponsor kids, THANK YOU! We could not do this without your partnership. If you would like to be a part of Gary's support team, please go here. For information on child sponsorship, go here.

The Beauty of Books

Why does our society still value books so highly? Why do we love and respect them so? We know why. Tweets and Vines have their place, but a book is a slower and deeper thing. Every book is an invitation to spend meaningful time alone with the person behind it—a storyteller you love, a mind you admire, a member of your family. Once you pick up that book, you have that person’s full attention, for as long as you choose to spend in his or her company. In our distracted world, that’s worth a great deal. —Joel Segel, Publishers Weekly, “Enduring Value,” Jan 30, 2015

The Emotionally Healthy Leader

While I'm in Africa, I'm happy to bring you a guest post from Peter Scazzero, author of The Emotionally Health Leader: It is possible to build a church, an organization, or a team by relying only on our gifts, talents, and experience. We can serve Christ in our own energy and wisdom. We can expand a ministry or a business without thinking much of Jesus or relying on him in the process. We can boldly preach truths we don’t live.I was in my early years as a Christian when I first came to grips with the sad truth that God appeared to use prominent Christian leaders whose relationship with Jesus was either nonexistent or seriously under-developed. It was a discovery that left me confused and disoriented. Yet, after decades in ministry, I am no longer so confused. Why? Because I have experienced to some degree what it’s like to be one of those leaders. I have prepared and preached sermons without thinking about or spending time with Jesus. I know the experience of doing good things that helped a lot of people while being too busy or caught up in my own whirlwind of leadership worries to be intimately connected to Jesus.Consider the following quick check-up of how your experience of remaining in loving union with Jesus is going:You Know You’re Not Experiencing Loving Union When You . . .

1. Can’t shake the pressure you feel from having too much to do in too little time.
2. Are always rushing.
3. Routinely fire off quick opinions and judgments.
4. Are often fearful about the future.
5. Are overly concerned with what others think.
6. Are defensive and easily offended.
7. Are routinely preoccupied and distracted.
8. Consistently ignore the stress, anxiety, and tightness of your body.*
9. Feel unenthusiastic or threatened by the success of others.
10. Routinely spend more time talking than listening.

____________* Geri and I like to say, “The body is a major, not a minor prophet.” In other words, the body often knows before the mind when our life is out of alignment with God. For example, my stomach gets knotted, my neck tightens, I sweat, I clench my fists, my shoulders stiffen, I can’t sleep, etc.Jesus faced overwhelming pressures in his life — pressures that far outstrip anything most of us will ever face. Yet he routinely stepped away from those endless leadership demands to spend significant time with the Father. He slowed down to ensure he was in sync with God — that he was in the Father and the Father was in him, powerfully filling every crevice of his body, mind, and spirit. In routinely stepping away from his active work, he entrusted the outcome of his circumstances, problems, and ministry to the Father. And as a result, every action Jesus took was rooted in a place of deep rest and centeredness out of his relationship with God.The question we each must wrestle with regularly is this: In what ways does my current pace of life and leadership enhance or diminish my ability to allow God’s will and presence full scope in my life? And may God give you the grace to make one or two changes in your schedule to slow down for loving union with Jesus today.Peter Scazzero is an author and pastor of New Life Fellowship outside of New York City and is the author of The Emotionally Healthy Leader. Find out more about emotional health at www.EmotionallyHealthy.org 

A Summer of Travel

Back in 2008, when my husband was considering the offer by East-West Ministries (E-W) to change from a legal-administration career to serve as their East Africa field leader, I had one main reservation: I would not get to travel any more. I feared we would not be able to afford airfare.By the end of that year, I prayed, "Enough! Dear God, just one month in my own bed, please!"That was seven years ago, and it was the last summer I stepped on African soil. So today I'm scheduled to return to Kenya. The plan is for me to have a travel and a rest day with my guy, then meet some of the nationals with whom he works that I have never met. After that, I am to return to the states via Dubai while he goes on to Ethiopia with the rest of the team.Yes, a team. Six of us are headed out—taking an advancement team from E-W, who will get an up-close-and-personal look at the field in order to inform people back home about developments there.It has been a summer of international travel. It began with a two-week course I led in Italy. Eighteen people from DTS learned about Medieval Art and Spirituality, as I was co-teaching with a colleague. Marvelous! A week after I returned, I taught a three-week course in Creative Writing with a great group of students and a wonderful teaching assistant. Now Africa.Late in August, I am scheduled to go to Oregon to take a shift helping with my dad's care, to meet with my agent, and to whisk my older sister off to the coast for an overnight to celebrate her birthday.In the meantime, I've been working on a redesign of Kindred Spirit magazine, and recruiting contributors for a compilation work I pitched to Kregel that the publisher accepted. The working title: Vindicating the Vixens: Men and Women Revisiting Stories of Sexualized and Marginalized Women in the Bible. As the subtitle suggests, the work takes a fresh look at people that we've wrongly sexualized (e.g., Tamar, Bathsheba) and/or marginalized (e.g., Hagar, the Virgin Mary). I now have a wonderfully diverse group of male and female scholars committed to helping.But it hasn't been all work. With summer's slower pace, I've enjoyed reading The Girl on the Train, a bestselling work of suspense by a first-time author. And right now I'm learning about the universe in A Brief History of Time. Yes, the author is an atheist. I ignore that part. It is still full of wonder that leads me to marvel and worship. Did you know that part of how we determine the distance from Earth to a star is by the color it emits as it moves? The movie The Theory of Everything, which I loved, led me to read more. In conjunction with that, I'm listening to a Mars Hill Audio podcast interview with Michael Hanby, author of No God, No Science. Hanby talks about why there is no “neutral” science, and how all accounts of what science does and why contain metaphysical and theological assumptions.Another interesting read this summer that I've not blogged about was I Am Malala. It's about Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani schoolgirl who stood up to the Taliban and defended her right to an education. So many books, so little time!Please pray for us as we come to mind this week.

The Artemis of Acts 19: Not a Fertility Goddess

For years I've been studying the identity of Artemis of the Ephesians as the earliest Christians would have understood her. I think a correct understanding of her cult has ramifications for how we read 1 Timothy. Part one of my conclusions recently appeared in the scholarly journal Bibliotheca Sacra. You can now read my first Artemis Bib Sac article online.Photo: Remains of a second-century statue of Artemis of the Ephesians that I saw when visiting Jordan, some thousand miles away.

Podcast: Marriage and Infertility

Join me as I speak with Belah on the Delight Your Marriage podcast about marriage and infertility.     

Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead

My thoughts on: Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead by Sheryl SandbergI first learned of Sheryl Sandberg, the COO of Facebook, when she did a riveting TEDTalk on Why We Have Too Few Women Leaders. It has now received more than two million hits. She gave some good career advice for women in business to “sit at the table” and pursue their goals with passion. I liked her style of using personal anecdotes combined with hard stats to back up her arguments.Recently, one of my young male colleagues told me I simply must read Sandberg’s book, Lean In. What seemed to impress him most was her 35 pages of endnotes. Again, she has based her arguments on overwhelming research.Thirty years after the USA reached the 50-50 mark of male/female college grads, men still hold most leadership positions in government and industry. Sandberg examines why women’s progress in achieving leadership roles has stalled—and it's not just because of sexism. Often women sabotage their own careers by "leaving before they leave." She goes on to give specific steps that both women and men can take to support women in the workplace and at home.I especially liked her section on how to pursue a mentor. Hint: Not by asking someone to mentor you.An unexpected benefit of Lean In was that the book made me profoundly grateful for some men in my life. My husband is a full partner, who has always done our grocery shopping, and from day one he shared the responsibility of "getting up with the baby." Additionally, two men have mentored me and informally sponsored me in my career, opening doors for me that I never would have tried to open for myself.I listened to this book on Audible, but you can't read endnotes or track down studies with audio books. So I just purchased a hard copy from Amazon. The Kindle copy was much less expensive, but I suspect I'll need to lend this one with frequency to my students, both male and female.

2015 Christy Award Winners Announced

The 2015 Christy Awards were held on Monday night, June 29, 2015, at the Rosen Center Hotel in Orlando. The awards honor excellence in Christian fiction in ten categories, and they have—through the years—truly raised the bar on storytelling from a Christian perspective. They were named for Catherine Marshall's wonderful book by the same name (i.e., Christy). The 2015 Christy Award Winners are as follows:Book of the Year – Thief of Glory, by Sigmund Brouwer (WaterBrook Multnomah)Contemporary Romance – A Broken Kind of Beautiful, by Katie Ganshert (WaterBrook Multnomah) Contemporary Series – The Amish Blacksmith, by Mindy Starns Clark and Susan Meissner (Harvest House Publishers)Contemporary – The Story Keeper, by Lisa Wingate (Tyndale House)First Novel – Feast for Thieves, by Marcus Brotherton (RiverNorth/Moody Publishing)Historical – The Sentinels of Andersonville, by Tracy Groot (Tyndale House Publishers)Historical Romance – Thief of Glory, by Sigmund Brouwer (WaterBrook Multnomah)Suspense – The Color of Justice, by Ace Collins (Abingdon Press)Visionary – Once Beyond a Time, by Ann Tatlock (Heritage Beacon Fiction)Young Adult – Storm Siren, by Mary Weber (Thomas Nelson)Each category of novels is evaluated against a ten-point criteria by a panel of seven judges (including my dear friend Kelley Mathews) composed of librarians, reviewers, academicians, literary critics, and other qualified readers, none of whom have a direct affiliation with a publishing company.Thanks to Ginny McCabe, Special to ASSIST News Service, for her assistance with this post. 

IVF for Sex Selection: It's Here, and It's a Bad Idea

Did you hear/read the news story about the couple who spent $100,000 and went through seven IVF attempts so they could have a baby girl? Make no mistake about it: this is wrong. The practice involved de-selecting the male embryos. So destruction of human life + sex discrimination = getting what they want.Some say this is a slippery slope. But it's not. The problem is not that it might lead to some evil. The evil is already present. Period.

#SCOTUSDecision #ChurchFreakOut

And a decree went out from SCOTUS on June 26, 2015, that couples of the same sex may receive marriage licenses that every state in the USA must recognize as legal.And the church in America freaked out.Yes, perhaps the earth shifted a bit under our feet. But Chicken Little was still wrong about the sky. The true ruler of the world is still on the throne. This decision did not even usher in the last days, as one friend’s hashtag suggested. Indeed, we were already in the last days. I refer readers to 2 Timothy 3:3ff, which describes people in those days as follows: lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying its power.“ When was the last time you saw #Obamagetsslandered #lastdays? We have our hierarchy of sins, and it does not always match God’s.Numerous solid Christians in leadership have been talking behind the scenes about how they think differently from what they hear the most vocal Christians saying about the SCOTUS decision. These quieter folks do embrace the Genesis story and ask questions such as, “Isn’t male/female difference in families a beautiful thing? Could a male/male marriage picture the ultimate extreme of patriarchy, excluding women from the home? Isn’t diversity better?”Yet these same concerned citizens still do not object greatly to the SCOTUS decision and in many cases even support it. Allow me, please, to share in public what I’m hearing in private from them—and again, they are mature Christians who embrace inerrancy and male/female marriage and celibacy for Christians with same-sex attraction.1. Many, many, many, many people who say same-sex marriage is a sin have been or are themselves promiscuous. Many are serial monogamists. They engage in premarital relations. And they have contributed to an industry that objectifies human beings (i.e., porn). This is what the Bible calls hypocrisy and self-righteousness, and God hates it. As someone said on my FB page, “The expectation that gay people be celibate is a huge sacrifice to ask of people. When it is asked by a Christian culture that is not living radically sacrificial lives, it seems off.” We need to remove the log in our own eye.2. If we believe in a literal translation of what God does with people who engage in same-sex relationships (i.e., Romans 1:24), why would we expect a secular nation to be stricter than God? The father of the prodigal son let him go. By fighting this change, are we trying to force the younger brother to stay home? Someone asked, “Do we apply the same logic to murder, theft or other sins? If the secular nation decides that your property is up for grabs, are you going to say ‘why do we expect a secular nation to obey God's laws’?” The answer is, "Of course not." At the core of the difference between the SCOTUS decision and murder or theft is consent. An action that involves only two consenting adults differs radically from one consenting adult and victim(s). That is why in this country, premarital sex between consenting adults is legal, but rape is not. That is not to say God smiles on the former. But the latter is much more of a threat to the public good, and a greater violation of someone’s autonomy. Thus law. Make no mistake about it: The law is not the ideal.3. Most people in America do not self-identify as evangelicals. Should we tell them they have to abide by our religion’s standards? Would we want someone to impose their religious standards on us? One graduate from an evangelical seminary wrote, “I believe gays should be able to marry. And when they do and they find that life isn't happily ever after, wouldn't it be great if true believers could be around to point to Peace?”4. The USA never was a Christian country. There is no such thing as a Christian nation. Paul wrote to people who were proud to be Romans, and he reminded them “Our citizenship is in heaven” (Phil 3:20). Only there will the government overtly rest on Messiah’s shoulders. The fact that Judas was going to have to wait for that kind of government is precisely what hacked him off. Indeed, it was his nationalism that made him miss the real King (and Judas had more reason than do Americans to think his country was God’s chosen nation). It was the German church’s nationalism that made them miss the danger of Hitler. To say that the USA has ever been a Christian nation is to deny (a) that it secured the freedom of all religions and required no specific religion of its citizens; (b) its Constitution as originally intended was completely unbiblical in its view of humanity (recall that women and blacks had fewer rights and/or were less fully human than white males); (c) the person credited with drafting the Declaration of Rebellion against England was a deist who impregnated his slave, literally cut Jesus’s miracles out of his Bible, and considered Trinitarianism misguided. Some of our founding fathers were believers. Thomas Paine, Thomas Jefferson, and Ben Franklin certainly were not. But the point is that—while many may have been Christians—they did not set up a Christian-only nation. We have always been a pluralistic country, protecting the rights of Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Wiccans, atheists.Baptists have insisted on separation of church and state from the beginning. Yes, Christians have enjoyed great favor in the secular USA. But Uncle Sam is not our spiritual father.5. Marriage is a good thing. People quote statistics about gays having multiple partners, but these same people stand in the way of gays making commitments. Is that fair? Is that right? In an ethics hierarchy, isn’t commitment better than un-commitment? Wouldn’t we want people to prefer commitment over promiscuity?6. We shouldn’t act so surprised. A seminary student wrote, “I see pastors conceding to the pressure or people expressing a chastising disappointment in America. I can’t get on board with this perspective because honestly I don’t have this expectation that our country should or will uphold our religious beliefs. That might be because I’m used to living in a country that doesn’t fully support me as a African-American woman or because I have grown up in an America has become less and less ‘Christian’ over the years.”7. A lot of the church's response is embarrassing and a terrible testimony. (One seminary grad I know was especially repulsed by the preacher screaming at the little girl waving a rainbow flag.)That said, these thoughtful people also wonder….1. What is the purpose of marriage? Isn’t it to picture Christ and the church? Does the church really model this and teach this? And should we expect unbelievers to embrace this ideal (see Eph. 5)?2. Is the church perhaps too interconnected with the state? Why are we following the government in referring to marriage as an "institution"? Isn’t it a covenant?3. Why didn’t Paul rage against Rome’s unjust laws that prohibited slaves from marrying? Didn’t Christian slaves commit to each other anyway? Did Paul even look to the government to legitimize or have any say about a holy covenant?4. Does the law of the land change anything about the church’s teaching on marriage? If it does, woe to us.I was reminded recently of something C.S. Lewis wrote more than sixty years ago in Mere Christianity. Speaking about how the divorce rate in his world was shooting up, he said, “My own view is that the Churches should frankly recognize that the majority of the British people are not Christian and, therefore, cannot be expected to live Christian lives. There ought to be two distinct kinds of marriage: one governed by the State with rules enforced on all citizens, the other governed by the church with rules enforced by her on her own members. The distinction ought to be quite sharp, so that a man knows which couples are married in a Christian sense and which are not.”Now then, we live in a country in which we still have free speech and in which the actual number of true believers is not dropping. We have the right as citizens to advocate for what we believe is best for all humans. But unfortunately we have done so disrespectfully. We have sometimes told the truth without love. We have sometimes distorted the truth. And we have certainly exaggerated the threat to true faith. We must do better!We must be morally blameless.We must be more honest and humble in our rhetoric.We must not confuse good citizenship with unbiblical nationalism.We must not expect unbelievers to hold to the standards God expects of believers.We must pray for our leaders instead of slandering them.We must speak the truth in love.We must remember where our citizenship lies and, where necessary, redirect our thinking about our own security.We must hold on to hope.In the words of our Lord, “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom” (Luke 12:4–7, 32). But it is not of this world.

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