A Day In December

I got up this morning poured a cup of coffee and checked the news on line. I began skimming the headlines but stopped when I noticed I had an email from a friend we met in Russia who is now living in the states. He wrote that there had been a shooting at a YWAM (Youth With A Mission) base in Colorado. I immediately went back to the headlines I had skimmed over and there it was right in front of me, “Gunman Kills Two at Missionary Center.”
My wife and I have had a long term relationship with YWAM, our son served in YWAM for over seven years, we have supported them in various ways over the years and I have taught at YWAM bases in Russia, Africa and locally both in San Francisco and Salem. Our house has been, and still, is a type of hostel for YWAMers who are passing through our area, they know they can call ahead and have a homey place to stay for the night.
Right now our son is at the YWAM base in Montana and we talked to him this morning about the killings at the base (a place where young people receive training before heading out on two month long missions trips into various areas of the world). Our son went to the Montana base to pick up a girl who is going to school there. I met this girl for the first time here in Salem across the counter at a local Starbucks, she worked there. We had a few conversations and found the common ground of YWAM and after an introduction she became a friend of our son over the next year. As we spoke with our son regarding the shooting he said that this girl had just gotten off the phone with a friend of hers who is currently attending the school in Colorado where the shooting had taken place. Her friend had the painful honor of holding one of the shooting victims in their arms as the wounded person slowly died of their injuries.
A person normally thinks that missionaries get killed on the mission field, “out there” in some remote place where people are bad and the enemy tries to stop the spreading of gospel. You’re right people do get killed “out there” for sharing the gospel but don’t think for one minute that it has to be limited to specific boundaries that we’ve defined, The enemy doesn’t care where people, who are willing to share the gospel, get killed. If he can be effective in destroying them out in the field as a way of creating fear that might keep others from trying to do the same, how much more effective can he be if he could make you afraid of even being trained “to go” in the first place?
Here’s the bottom line. The person who wants to overcome will do so in the offensive not the defensive. We can’t sit in our churches trying to influence legislation and public opinion by slipping ballot measures out from under our doors into the big bad world in hopes of changing our society and thus stay off the devils obvious encroachment into our lives. The enemy is not, IS NOT, impressed with our rantings and ravings against him, he’s not. He does and will bring all he has against the kingdom of God whether it’s “out there”, at a missions school, and yes right through the doors of your church. It will not be long before shootings WILL occur within the confines of our sacred and blessed bunkers. Face it the enemy is arrogantly and confidently set against all that is of God, or anything that even looks like God for that matter. He could give a rats ass if we’re a purpose driven church, or if we know our “destiny” or our “DNA” in Christ. He doesn’t care if we’ve prayed to God that He expand our territory in agreement with the prayer of Jabez, “Sorry, not impressed!” He doesn’t care if we THINK we’re a bunch of spiritual “bad asses”.
The enemy of our soul is not going to shrink back because we have volumes of books authenticating the proof of our spiritual authority over him in Christ. Ppptttt!
Jesus said to “go”. In that act of “going and proclaiming” there was the provision of power necessary to overcome the attacks of the enemy. So they went, planted, raised up, resisted opposition as it presented itself, expanded, overcame, went further, preached, planted, increased etc.
On the other hand those who barricaded themselves in the temple doing the religious thing soon (about seventy years) found the enemy right outside their doors ready to bring it down and they did just that, the enemy laid siege to it in a big way. “Not one stone was left stacked upon the other“. Trust me, they weren’t concerned one bit with what God thought, AT ALL. This didn’t bother God, He had moved on in the power of a new covenant. His kingdom was advancing beyond Jerusalem and to the ends of the earth. Were there attacks? Sure. Were there some losses? Absolutely. Did the church grow and thus slowly chip away at the world and its existing governments? Oh yeah! Did kingdoms and governments come and go as the gospel continued to advance? Still does!
The enemy has come and is now outside the gates of the temple, safety and victory is on the outside in the offensive act of going forth in the “power of the proclamation”. If we lock our doors and our lips we are as good as dead, if not now, surely later.

If the Truth Be told

In this information age truth can easily become defined by those who control the various forms of media, simply put, if you control the media, (television, radio or print), you can easily spin truth to be what you want it to be in the hearts and minds of the masses. Granted the end run of the internet has been able to chip away a little but for the vast majority influence still remains in the hands of a select few. Spinning of truth is a great tool for moving the masses in a direction beneficial to those who hold the media reigns because they usually have a vested interest in being able to influence large numbers of people. The history of this country has proven many times over that for the most part public opinion really isn’t “public” it’s published.
It’s safe to say that the truth put forth by any media machine will surely reflect the opinions and beliefs of those who gather and control the flow of information, you can’t help it. This is where bias comes into play and for sure the Media Boss gets to set the rules, he gets to pick the teams and decide who gets to play after all it’s his or her ball in the first place. Media Boss decides who gets heard, what view is expressed and what opinion is allowed to be formed. So if you’re a person who can benefit by reaching a large number of people you may want to be involved with people who control the media, (getting into the inner circle as it were is the place for you). It really doesn’t matter if what you say is credible or truthful, what matters is that you agree with what Media Boss believes the truth to be. Just “agree to agree” and you can enjoy participation in the wonderful career of shaping public opinion. On the other hand if you don’t agree with Media Boss there’s a better chance of Paris Hilton being invited to speak at a Freegan rally than you being invited back to express your opinion. And remember no one wants a difficult, abrasive, critical, narrow minded person who “doesn’t get it” voicing their opinion and causing everyone unnecessary grief. What’s interesting is how many people are actually willing to accept a fabricated fructose laden truth as “their” truth in order to have an ongoing invitation extended to them to “be heard” or “voiced” in these various media venues. Being heard on the radio, seen on television or read in print can easily influence most men’s egos and is a very enticing carrot, so much so that “real” truth is compromised in a persons life for the attainment of the notoriety that “exposure” provides them. But beware lest you stray off the path of compromise because one can quickly go from beloved to banished with a simple slip of a tongue that might venture back to speaking the truth.
Those who speak truth are seldom on the “A” list or even the “C” list for that matter, they’re left to hawk truth along the fringes of the religious red carpet seldom caught in the lenses of the pious’ promotional paparazzi.
Truth peddling is a double edged sword for sure, Media Boss realizes the need to maintain “believer-ship” (a term I’ve given to those who don’t realize the real reason their loyalty is so important) believer-ship translates into profits generated by selling space or time to those who are willing to advertise in Media Boss’ media kingdom. The numbers associated with those willing to “tune in” to hear truth is critical to those who might buy space from Media Boss. “Screw truth, I want my advertising dollars to reach the largest number of people possible in order to generate the most amount of profit through increased sales.” says the indifferent businessman. For Media Boss this can become the tail wagging the dog because he knows he must decide, “What must truth sound or look like in order to keep my believer-ship up so I don’t lose the money Mr. Businessman brings me?” Even Media Boss’ truth can’t be all that he would like it to be or he’ll lose Mr. Businessman.
One would think this subversive plot to stifle truth for the sake of personal profit is a practice and struggle found only in the secular media, oddly enough it happens just as much in Christian media circles as well, for all you know the scenario I just presented could easily be founded on an actual christian experience. Now don’t get all up in arms and think this is something new to christianity, it’s not, it existed in the time of Jesus and will continue until He returns. See, Jesus (Truth) came to present Truth (Himself) to Israel because what they were being offered by the religious leaders (Media Bosses) of the day wasn’t truth at all, well kind of, it had a little truth in it but was layered with so much other stuff (spin) that it didn’t benefit the hearer as it related to God. Making God known was pretty much out of the picture and seeing or understanding God was becoming increasingly difficult for the “hearers”. This had been the rub all through the ages and the so the One who was Truth came to establish truth among His own. What happened to Jesus happens even today to all those who would attempt to follow in His footsteps. If you come proclaiming real, critical, tough to sell, life changing, uncompromising truth, the Media Bosses will do their best to make sure you don’t succeed. They tried their best to keep Jesus from speaking truth, the prophets and his disciples (and we might as well throw in Luther). Truth always works to exalt and advance God’s plans, our greatest good, and His glory. Those who need to control the faithful don’t want them to hear this truth, it has to be skewed a little first to ensure that it remains palatable enough to maintain good believer-ship thus ensuring profitability. If you look at the reaction of the religious leaders when Jesus was freely offering truth to all who would listen, they were concerned about how it was going to affect their financial well being as it related to the “religious” and political system in place at the time. More than once the apostle Paul found himself in the cross hairs of people who were upset at the fact that the truth he spoke was going to cost them financially. A warm reception soon turned into a hostile reaction once he opened his mouth and truth came spewing forth. Both Jesus and Paul had people going around behind the scenes stirring up the crowds through false (“spun”) information designed to sway public opinion against them.
A person can actually do a very good job of grasping, articulating and presenting a great case for truth desiring to have it distributed in Media Boss’s kingdom for the encouragement of the faithful in Christ only to have it evaluated by Media Boss himself who tosses it out for no reason other than personal bias toward the writer. Important rule to remember: If you want to appear in print or on the air don’t “piss off” Media Boss

The mantra parroted among the loyal and well respected “spiritual” leaders of the Media Kingdom sounds a little like this:
“Truth like this can’t be found entirely in the bible, no sir, you can only get the whole truth from US”, proclaim the spiritual leaders who have found favor with Media Boss, “So don’t go looking for ALL the truth in the bible cause you won’t find it there, God has given US a special word, a special revelation, a seed of truth which WE alone are to give birth to among you. This GREAT truth, this GREAT revelation which WE have freely received from God through OUR unique anointing IS available to you by tuning to this station, reading this certain publication or attending one of our churches in order to hear it” and receive it”. If this isn’t possible then fortunately this truth IS available and can be attained by purchasing a CD, DVD or one of the newly released books one of US have written, each for only $19.95. It’s available to you at this price because it’s THAT important”

Wisdom and knowledge, it says in scripture, begins with the fear of the Lord, not the being afraid of God fear, but rather to perceive and be consciously aware of the Holy dread that He is, to understand that God is a consuming fire by His very nature and subsequently we are but dry stubble in ours. This fear is established upon a justified revelation which has a foundation affirmed and established in truth. Accurate truth of God causes us to know, see and understand His transcendent Holy being and as a result reveals our lowly offensive position in such a way that we might be compelled to desperately seek Him. Most people don’t want to deal with any truth which reveals how wicked we are in relation to how Holy God is. Our being bad doesn’t cause God to appear more holy, rather God’s holiness is so utterly flawless that in comparison our greatest goodness is found to be utterly base. This kind of truth is not fun nor will it sustain believer-ship. Needless to say it has no place in the numbers market. Truth is truth and can’t be up-sold or devalued by spin of any kind. It’s not a commodity or a market share. Truth says what is.
As Walter Cronkite used to say, “And that’s the way it is.”