The Manual

The Media and the Manual

I have recently watched the BBC's History of Christianity, and am currently plowing through CH4's "The Bible A History".

Of course these programmes are not serious theology, but they deal with the heart and soul of belief in God, and manage to do so in ways that alternate from truly factually poor to truly showing a lack of understanding.

It is a shame the media can no longer deal with God properly.

I want to talk about the intriguing episode of "The Bible" which had Catholic Ann Widdecombe dealing with the Ten Commandments.

The reaction of the "New Atheists" to this was startling. The vitriol and bile of both Christopher Hitchens and Stephen Fry was truly scary. What puzzled me most was, what is not to like about the Commandments?

Stephen seemed upset that God was commanding us, we, it seems are too lofty to be commanded by God. It's OK to be commanded by those losers in parliament who steal from us via their expenses? But not by God? Seriously?

Hitler was too lofty to be commanded, he managed to ignore "thous shalt not murder" about 6 million times, and the war that deposed him led to anopther 30 million deaths. Stalin was too lofty to be commanded, he managed to kill 20 million Soviets long before the nazis started a war that lost 20 million more. Pol Pot... well, suffice to say that it may have been valid in 1900 to say that Religion had led to more death than love. But after the 20th Century Atheists lead the genocide league tables by far.

What is wrong with the Commandments?

I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. "You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing love to a thousand {generations} of those who love me and keep my commandments. "You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.

Commandments such as these would be wrong coming from Parliament (but Parliament expects us to obey no other parliament but them!) But these come from God. It is worng to assume God is just some nice powerful bloke who you can be on first name terms with, he is God! Creator of the Universe. Why cannot he demand that sort f respect? Even yourMP wants to be called "Right Honourable Gewntleman" while he fiddles your expenses. If you take God as existing, even if only for the sake of a discussion about the commandments, then surely these are perfectly reasonable things for an Omnipotent Creatior to demand?

So what comes next?

"Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your animals, nor the alien within your gates. For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

My mum always said The Sabbath was a way to make sure ordinary working people got some time off back in the days before Unions. Makes sense for God to do that, a loving God, and not a God only of the rich.

 Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you.

Makes more sense than ASBOs for hoodies doesn't it?

 You shall not murder.

What's your proiblem Mr Hitchens?

 You shall not commit adultery.

Of course this appals Mr Fry. I have no idea why. Everyone slags off marriage, but has anyone proved anything other than that the statistics for co-habiting couples splitting up and leaving kids in the lurch is worse than marriage. Marriage is not perfect, but it's better than anything else man has invented, and marriage without adultery would have better statistics.

You shall not steal.

You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.

What is wrong with not stealing or lying?

 You shall not covet your neighbor's house. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his manservant or maidservant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor

On the programme a psyhcologist said coveting was natural and good. Is it? Seriously?

Doesn't it rather lead to crime? drugs? De[ression? feelings of inadequacy? When i was in Soweto I learned that people can be happy with those of God's blessings they have, not needing those they don't have. They put ME to shame, I am sure they put Mr Hitchens and Mr Fry to shame.

Messrs Hitchens and Fry will blame God (if they believed he existed) for poverty. Insread of seeing that God's creation has provided enough resources and wealth to feed and clothe and give medication to everyone on it. Everyone. The unfairness of that distribution is man's problem, not God's.

They don't respect that God gives us free will so that the rich can ignore the poor. They think that if God existed he would force us to do this.

They don't want even to be commanded by God not to murder... but they want God to force the world to be equitable.

The picture I remember most was Hitchens getting up and walking out, because he was so upset that Bible was Evil and being given to children, unable to face another question, and unable to offer another solution. It did rather hurt though to see the Ste[hen Fry i jhave always admired (literally) with spittle running down his chin as he fulminated at a God who bullies people.

Jamie Bulger was murdered by bullies. It broke God's heart, and maybe even made himthink about his guarantee of our free will to choose. Meanwhile Messrs Fry and Hitchens think God's a bully for saying "Thou shalt not murder."

Sheesh

Now there's a thought...

I finished God on Mute by Pete Grieg this week, and it led to some interesting moments.

I was on a plane to Istanbul when I finished it, but let me start at the beginning.
Cutting a long (and painful) story very short, I went to the dentist on Tuesday and discovered I need to have a tooth extracted. Yes, old fashioned tooth pulling. (Although hopefully with new technology and drugs to ease the pain!)

Anyway this has been a source of HUGE anxiety.(Not to mention a fair amount of unanswered prayer)

Anyway, towards the end of Pete's book (page 297 if you have a copy handy) he says that God asks the question Jesus asked Mary on Easter Sunday: "Why are you crying?"
Pete says:
Tell Him!
cry, rant lament....

So, there I was sat on the plane to Istanbul, surrounded by businessmen, and I told Him.

"Heavenly Father I am so scared..." and I let loose a few tears.

Anyway, today, I was walking down to the Fulham Road, having my usual meandering chat with the Lord. (As an aside, reading Pete's book, and Yancey's book "Prayer" has made me feel rather good that its OK to have these rambling chats with Him pretty much all day long. Actually, as a father myself, - and to paraphrase the Gospels, I, who am evil, would love to hear all about my daughters' days, so how much more then does our Father in Heaven want to hear all about everything we are doing?)

Anyway, I said as I was rambling
"Heavenly Father, I am scared."
And the thing was, I didn't feel scared. So I asked myself if I was fibbing to Him, and so I did what I always do when I feel that might be the case. I said
"Lord, you see into my heart, you know how scared I am"

Suddenly it struck me.
Maybe every time I say "Lord I am scared"
I become just a little bit less scared.

Maybe ranting works the same way with our anger?
Maybe lamenting works the same way with our sorrow?

As John Sentanu said the other night (I apologise for yet more paraphrasing) "The psalmists knew what they were about you know!"

Boys and Girls Come Out to Play

Anyone who attended the "what women want" men's breakfast ought to have worked out that aside from giving the 220 malcontents who dragged themselves out of bed on a Saturday morning a few hints on how to pull Christian girls, that the girls communicated a problem too.

No Christian boys are trying to pull them!

All the girls were brilliant but I think Emma Brown was very insightful on this aspect in particular. Dating within the HTB community really is dating in a Goldfish Bowl.

For those of you who weren't there let me summarise two key points:

• If a boy asks an HTB girl out and she says no - he still has to see her every single week at the 7pm.
• If a girl dates a boy once and it doesn't work out, he has to worry if every girl now thinks he is a boring loser.

Of course it helps if you aren't a boring loser, and thankfully the girls did give some useful hints on that score.

However, it IS a problem, and its a problem faced by the boys, although the girls are suffering the side effects.

It is faced by the boys because, whether you are a Christian girl who believes that the Godly man who is intended for you will be confident, able to be a leader in a relationship, and certainly have enough gumption to ask you out, or, even if you just believe in Greg Behrendt, you still think it is the boy's job to do the asking.

And risk the humiliation.

I think this idea of the humiliation (and I really do KNOW that males worry about this) brings me to the fact that in their fast this year the girls have worked out that spiritual warfare is part of this. I know that spiritual warfare is something that raises eyebrows as a concept even among committed Christians, but let's face it, Satan has no interest in new relationships among Christians, new Christian marriages, new Christian families. He has a vested interest in keeping Christian boys and girls apart.

So what can we do to fight this battle? To foster an outbreak of affection emotion and commitment in our Church?

Well, for a start, unless you went to  a convent or public school, we have all had experience of dating in a goldfish bowl before. When you are a teenager you date in the goldfish bowl of school. I suppose our raging hormones conquered our fear. I certainly remember that all the worst excesses of gossip and humiliation were present, but, there were some mechanisms that we at HTB can learn from school dating.

Here is how I remember it working:

• Girl A fancies boy X. She can't ask him out, so she discusses her feelings with best mate, girl B.
• Girl B finds herself sitting with boy X's best mate, boy Y.
• She says "if X were to fancy A, and if he were to ask her out, i am sure she would say yes"

Boy Y rushes in a hormone crazed frenzy to his mate X and says:
"A fancies you!"

The thing is, it IS fair enough that you don't want to be the girl asking the boy out, but it is also fair enough that the boy doesn't want to be humiliated inside a tight knit community.

So we can learn lessons from the 6th form common room, really we can.

What does it mean for girls?
it means having networks, it means being willing to share some things with people you trust, and it means girls working for each other.

It means that there can be no gossip too.
If first dates don't work out, both boys and girls have a commitment to say "we just didn't click" and not to go into detailed diatribes about nose-picking and awful taste in music.

As I am engaged to the most beautiful girl at HTB I don't have this problem. But I for one am happy to oil any wheels that need oiling. Because I think the married community at HTB has a role to play.

One of the worst things about being of a certain age and single is so many of your friends are couples. And there is nothing worse than being invited to a dinner party and finding yourself the only single there. Actually there is something worse - turning up and finding a single member of the opposite sex there in a transparent attempt to fix you up.

As couples we can help. But not by inviting one boy and one girl to a couples event.  But by inviting 3-4 boys and 3-4 girls to an event which has NO couples.

As a fairly social person, I have no problem having drinks parties for singles from Church.

I feel blessed that God found me, and that he has given me the most gorgeous Christian princess to love and adore and to marry. And I think that as a Church we have a duty to work for that blessing for others, for their happiness and for the glory of God who tells us it is our rightful state.

Which brings me briefly to another issue that emerged at the men's breakfast.

"Just because we are dating doesn't mean I view you as my life partner"

Well maybe not in the bad old secular world. But in the Christian world?
I think this idea raises its head much, much sooner in the Christian world and for obvious reasons.

Here they are:

• We are designed to want sex
• God designed us to want sex
• Not just to enjoy it with our spouse, but to want it.
• God also tells us to wait till we are married.

So, you date, and you click. You don't leap into bed. You won't leap into bed. But, if you really click, you know you WANT to leap into bed. At which point, you HAVE to ask yourself whether this girl/boy is a potential marriage partner. Don't you?

Of course asking yourself and asking them are two different things. I am going to leave that debate for another time.

I hope this blog spreads around Christian Communities and that people post comments that move the cause along, because, Christian boys and girls dating and marrying is to the glory of God.

Enron and the cult of Emperor Worship

I have been reading a lot about Enron lately, and, recently watched the movie. (The smartest guys in the room).

I have also just started the adventure that is the Book of Revelations. Needless to say, Revelations has been freaking me out, and bemusing me more than somewhat (as Damon Runyon would have put it).

So I started reading stuff that might enlighten me about Revelations. Now I know what Dispensational Interpretation is, I have to say, I don't feel any better. However, when I read today about the Cult of Emperor worship I knew I had to blog.

I always feel pompous lecturing on Church history. I have been a Christian for five minutes, and it doesn't sit well on my shoulders to do that. BUT. All I know about communicating with people (which, by God's Grace is really quite a lot) tells me that assuming knowledge in your audience is a huge mistake.

So, if you really need to know how Roman Emperor worship worked and how it lay behind a lot of Christian persecution, wikipedia comes to our rescue, here and here.

That gets me off the hook on pompous lecturing.

So what has all this to do with Enron?

Well the movie has some pretty sordid tape recordings of Enron traders talking about how cool it would be if George W Bush made their boss Ken Lay secretary of energy. (he nearly did too, George W was a big Enron fan).

The Enron staff, the Enron shareholders, the business media, all practically deified the management of Enron.
Why?
Because they made money, and, let's face it we live in a society where money is worshiped.
We live in a world where earthly power is worshiped.

So there is Emperor worship all around us.
In China where the communist party hierarchy is not allowed to be criticized.
In New York, where no one could suggest that Enron were con artists ( until they were...)
and now we have Madoff. (If he has passed you by check here.)

What's my point?

Well in the first century Christian persecution was legalized by Emperor Worship. If Domitian was God, then Jesus couldn't be. It was easier, more lucrative and safer to worship Emperor Domitian and feed Christians to lions, than to give up profit and follow the Lamb.

Well look around you today!
There are many countries where Christian persecution today is every bit as deadly as it was 1930 years ago.
But even in the civilized west there is Christian persecution of a more subtle form.
The snide remarks, the jokes, the raised eyebrows.
We are told Christianity can't be right because there is no profit in it.
We are told Christianity can't be right because scientists have proved the world is more than 6000 years old.

All these other emperor-gods are worshipped so blindly.
Money
Science
Technology

"Technology is God, so Jesus can't be. Science trumps creation so the Bible can't be. I own 9 houses and have more money than i can ever spend, if i want the tree of life I will buy it"

In First Century Roman Empire you couldn't do business unless your Guild was affiliated with Emperor Worship. The Pax Romana was making free trade and money-making easier. The powers that be, and the rich, loved the enabler that was the Empire, so worshipping the Emperor became a smart move.

Worshiping God became dangerous.

And in 21st Century western life, it makes as much sense to worship the money that emerges from the Pax Americana, and to deifiy those whose gift is making money (or stealing it via fraud).

This isn't about our choice being hard.
Because we have made our choice - and thank heaven we made the right one.

It is about the wrongness of emperor worship for the non-Christian majority. Better by far to actually be atheist than to worship emperors.

Domitian was not God
The rulers of Enron were not God.
Bernard Madoff is not God.

History shows us that whenever the world gets to worshiping any of these emperors, then disaster beckons.

Only God is God and to him who overcomes he promises the tree of life.

We know what a good deal that is, the worshipers of emperors just don't get it.

See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ

Col 2: 8

Discipline? Well yes, one day...

I was listening to Radio 4, as usual, this morning.
Ros Altman, a former adviser to Tony Blair, and Jim O'Neill, chief economist at Goldman Sachs, discussed the Bank of England's decision to cut interest rates to the lowest level in 57 years.

I met Jim many years ago when he was at Marine Midland Bank New York (part of HSBC whose Frankfurt branch i was chief dealer of at the time).

Ros was propounding the view that low rates punished savers, and that, we had needed more savers in the past and that we got into this mess by imprudent lending and imprudent borrowing.

Good point Ros.

Jim, always a plain speaker was making the point that what we needed in the past was not relevant.

Well said, Jim.

I rarely say good things about anyone from HSBC - or Goldmans - for whom Jim now works, but, unsurprisingly, I found he spoke sense.

Here's the thing, Ros.

We do need savers, we need prudent savers, but to be a prudent saver, you need a job.
To be a prudent saver you need to have a house whose mortgage you can afford.

What we need now are safer jobs.
This means companies more sure of getting credit, and more sure that one or two folks might buy their products.

The Bank of England's current approach is right.

Jim said something fab about it being very English to worry about what we should do when we get out of this mess, when what we should be doing is whatever it takes to get out of the mess.

There is no doubt that Winston Churchill took steps that pretty much ensured that Britain was bankrupt after the war, and that our creditor, the US, would be handed on a plate, the dominance (economic and military) of the free world.

Bad boy Winston!
However, Winston at least ensured that he didn;t hand the dominance of the world tp Adolf Hitler.
Good boy Winston!

We learn in business (and in playing Puerto Rico) that you never have enough time and money and resources to do everything you want to do.

It will always make sense to solve the biggest problem first. Winston knew that. Winston was good in a crisis. He wasn't so clever if there wasn;t a crisis, but thankfully we had him when we really needed him.

Gordon Brown is not ever going to be Winston, but at least he too is solving the most pressing problem and not worrying about the others.

Ros, you ARE right, we need more savers in the future. We need a whole new culture, which values denial and waiting and discipline and not just instant gratification.
We certainly need a new culture in the City too.

But for now we need to survive. So I like the lower rates.

The manual does support Ros, and of course the manual supports prayer.
I think we have a better chance with prayer than we have with the Bank of England. But. Later let's try self discipline?

    No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.

Hebrews 12: 11

I suspect that little message is Pearls thrown to pigs, (Matthew 7:6) in the Big Brother generation, but we have to keep sowing seeds don't we?

2500 year old Proverbs still make sense

Proverbs 18:11

The wealth of the rich is their fortified city,
they imagine it an unscaleable  wall.

Matthew 5:19

Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal.

God has been telling people for thousands of years that money doesn't make you happy.
Of all the temptations to leave the path of light, money has had the longest run of success.

Here in 2008 we sit in the ruin of the system built by the worshippers of Mammon, and yet Mammon retains his worshippers.

It's hard to understand. Of course, living in the marketing generation we should understand that Mammon advertises. Constantly.  God doesn't.

But, God did create a marketing department. Many years ago He inaugurated it with 12 people, but He told us all, through those 12 people, and the words and sacrifice of His only Son, He told US to be His marketing department.

As a novice Christian I feel the conflict between being passionately evangelistic and being one of "those" Christians who used to freak me out back in the days before the Holy Spirit jumped me. I am scared of preaching or ramming it down peoples throats - of casting my pearls before swine...I am sure more mature Christians feel that conflict too.

Well we are the only marketing God does, so let's not be shy ... let's meet the challenge of not being off-putting or fanatical, but let's do the job.

Everyday I get to choose

Freedom of choice is a tough blessing to deal with.

I struggle almost every day that the amazing grace of God can really forgive someone who has sinned as I have.

Being now a Christian, I need to re-believe every day that he really has forgiven me, that he really does love me, because Satan would have me believe otherwise

Sometimes I think life would be easier without freedom of choice...

I had a picture yesterday when I was walking on the Yorkshire Wolds (one of His finest creations). I commune with Him on the Wold, and I think He sent me this concept.

Everyday is like standing at a crossroads.
And, as you look to the left, you see that an earthquake or seismic something-or-other is causing the ground to open up. This ever widening fissure is heading straight for you.

Will it open up under your feet?
Will it open in front of you so you cannot progress?
Its movement seems erratic, if you jump, you might just as easily jump into it as avoid it.

But all you have to do is stand firm, and know that God loves you, and the chasm will always open behind you, so that you do NOT go back. You can walk forward, progress in the Way.

Reading Hebrews today seemed to confirm this message:

If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. Instead, they were longing for a better country - a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.
Hebrews 11, v15-16

Hurrah!

The secret of great blogging

... Is timing....I had spent about an hour today blogging about the mayhem in the financial markets, the greed that caused it, and related stuff. So when, a few minutes after I had finished I opened the manual and the following leapt out at me

Luke 3: 7-14

 John said to the crowds coming out to be baptized by him, "You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not begin to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our father.' For I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. The axe is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire."

 "What should we do then?" the crowd asked.

 John answered, "The man with two tunics should share with him who has none, and the one who has food should do the same."

 Tax collectors also came to be baptized. "Teacher," they asked, "what should we do?"

"Don't collect any more than you are required to," he told  them. Then some soldiers asked him, "And what should we do?"

      He replied, "Don't extort money and don't accuse people falsely—be content with your pay."

Sadly we need a few thousand other people to read that today, and every day for the coming months.

A message for Russell and Jonathon from Proverbs

Proverbs 26: 18-19

18 Like a madman shooting
       firebrands or deadly arrows

 19 is a man who deceives his neighbor
       and says, "I was only joking!"

Nuff said!

I really am not a dangerous radical who wants to destroy the very foundations of our society.

I am however beginning to question those foundations, because as a society we have lost sight of "fairness".

Now I don't want to lose sight of fairness. I just don't.  My friend Andy Heslop posted a comment the other week from my idol Winston who said that the free market system was a dreadful way to run an economy, but better than all the others.

It is also true that the Soviet experiment (I can't call it Marxism or Communism or Socialism) failed. Partially because actually we aren't all created equal.

We may not be equal. We may not deserve equal rewards. We may have different gifts and talents, and they may be assigned different values by society at different times. But what we should all be is treated fairly.
By society and by each other.

And the first thing is that the current market system is not fair. It is rife with insider trading for a start. Secondly the rewards are paid to the few, and the risks are carried by the many. Let me illustrate the risks and rewards a bit as we approach 2009:

The BBC news website carried an item today that said that redundancy will rise in 2009. It also (worryingly for Bozo) said that older workers would suffer most, as (rather unfairly) if you are over 65 your employer doesn't need a business reason to boot you onto the street!

My friend Robin (he of the rather clever oil price predictions) also emailed me recently to point out that City bonuses would still be £3 BILLION this year. I found an article that supports his theory here. (actually it was probably the source of his theory!)

So here's the thing.

There are a set of people in this world, whose greed, has led the world to the brink of a financial collapse that could have shaken our society past the crumbling of its foundations. These people could have levelled society far more effectively than a few outraged blogs by aging gurus like Bozo. They could have ended the world as we know it. And, aside from the fact that it was driven by greed and lacked all sense of moral or ethical value, it was also being bad at their jobs!

And the London City corps of that bunch of people will share out £3,000,000,000 next spring, for being bad at their jobs and almost ending the world.

That £3,000,000,000
could pay
£20,000
to
150,000 people next year.

People who haven't tried to destroy society.
People with families and mortgages.
And many of whom will be made redundant in 2009.

I think Andy Heslop, especially in the light of the Soviet failure is not wrong to say that the free market is better than the other systems.

But the manual still bears reading, because the sermon on the mount still represents the best system of managing a society that has ever been voiced.

Two quotes leap to mind:

    No one can serve two masters, either he will hate the one and love the other or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.

I don't think anyone would argue we have been serving money for many years. For obvious reasons. Like all false prophets it promises happiness sooner than heaven does. It has glamour and allure. It gets you in Hello Magazine. Which brings me to my second quote

In the sermon on the mount we are told that we can choose to be like:

    ...a wise man who builds his house on the rock. The rain came down, stream rose and the winds blew and beat against that house: yet it did not fall because it has its foundation on the rock.

It seems to me that following Money has made us more like:

    ...a foolish man who built his house upon sand. The rain came down the streams rose and the wind blew and beat against that house: and it fell with a GREAT CRASH

OK, I confess it was my idea to capitalise GREAT CRASH, but, seriously!

Still meaningful after all these years! I just think we need saving by someone other than Gordon Brown.