A revival that isn't.

A couple of the Christian television channels here are full of the latest 'revival' going on in Florida. I watched a little of it last night. I managed about 40 minutes before my brain started seizing up, turned over to UCB, where Peter Masters was preaching and five minutes of scripture-saturated teaching started my cogs whirring again.

The 'revival' is being noticed because of some healings apparently taking place. I know nothing about their veracity, but that's really not the point. The existence of signs and wonders does not 'a revival' make. I wondered exactly what was being taught, which is why I watched, having already had a look at the main 'teacher' Todd Bentley's website.

Extempore singing and music was the constant backdrop - repeated phrases like 'fire burn' and so on. Todd Bentley walked around the stage making pronouncements about the 'fire falling' and talking about new waves and new levels. He would perhaps say a paragraph's worth of coherent, if non-sensical, speech about various mystical 'angelic' teaching. Then he would walk about repeating phrases over and over. The crowd in front of him stood, all with their hands raised, some jerking about and swaying. That was it. No gospel, not even a bible opened. Oh, I heard the word Pentecost, but that was it.

One thing that was mentioned really stood out to me - the repeated exhortation to 'not put God in a box'. Now, I know what this usually means in this context. It means "Yes, this looks really out-of-the-ordinary, but just because it's not what you're used to, don't think it's not God."

But it's been standing out to me as one of the biggest ironies in modern charismania (and I use the phrase charismania because I do have charismatic friends who are highly skeptical). Because if you were to read the websites of the people involved, you'll see that for the longest time, they have been entirely focused on healings, spectacular events, mystical stories of angels and visions, and a mass hysterical event is what constitutes 'revival'.

That's not what I pray for when I pray for the Lord to send revival to my land - I pray for the church to faithfully preach His word, to live lives that stand out, to pray and serve - and then for the Holy Spirit to bring true conversion to many people.

It's almost inconceivable to the people involved in Florida that God's power works in an unspectacular way through the simple, unadorned preaching of His word and the humble faithfulness of His people. Their God is firmly stuck in a box labelled 'big show'.

I love the Doctor, but...

You know, I love The Doctor. He's a marvellously refreshing hero, solving problems with intelligence, rather than action-hero-paint-by-numbers-brawn.

Russell T Davies is an interesting storyteller, and he knows how to wring the emotion and drama out of things that should be, by rights, absolute silliness. In so far as human stories always have things in them that will reference redemption, there is material to be found in Doctor Who that will make interesting debate and illustration.

But the Doctor is a deeply flawed character, and the amount of convolutions you have to twist into to compare him usefully to the Lord Jesus Christ just gives me a headache.

Seriously, he's an alien with two hearts who is the sole survivor of a great war in which he killed his entire race, who inspires great devotion among the people he comes in contact with, but tends to utterly destroy their lives, if not leave them dead. It's all very dramatic, and topical given that it's now a primetime Saturday night family adventure show, but really.

Is that character more exciting and interesting than an Almighty God who became a human being (while still being God) and acheived the redemption of His enemies? Come on. It just isn't necessary to jump through these 'relevance' hoops to reach people. It's nonsense.

The Beeb reporting Islam/Christian issues misses the point again

More frustration-inducing religious reporting from the BBC. I'm baffled by the disconnect they've made between the 'getting a permit' issue and the 'being a Christian' issue.

Because, of course, if only those naughty Christians would get a permit, then they can have their churches, intimidation-free. Can they have a permit, then? Er, no, they can't, because Indonesia is a Muslim country.

Argh!

today's ramblings.

I've been thinking about feeling a bit out of place recently. In the most significant sense, it's entirely right that I don't fit anywhere perfectly on earth, I'm not supposed to get too comfy here.

But the very nature of not getting comfy means that I'm often uncomfortable. I'm slowly but surely getting back on an even keel, and recovering a sense of vision as a wife and mother. There are some really good places online to go and be encouraged in that. But inevitably, there will be differences, because home-making, while a godly pursuit, is not something exclusively Christian.

I have my interests and hobbies, like science fiction and writing in general, but that clearly isn't exclusively Christian, and sometimes and in some places can be downright anti-Christian.

Then there is the broad spectrum of Christendom itself, and my place in that. Some of the most uncomfortable places going are with other people who profess Christ in some capacity. Of course, the easy thing to do is to hive yourself away with those who believe as you do on every detail, but then you just become Darwin Fish and thus ridiculous.

But the happy medium between that and smudgy ecumenicalism is a ticklish business. I've thought of it before now as like a series of concentric circles, with those whom I go to church with on the smallest circle, and gradually widening out to those who I have little in common with but the label Christian.

But it's not quite accurate to view it like that, because there are some people with whom I have significant differences in one area, but with whom I am identical in another, and still other that are the opposite. Maybe they're not circles, more wibbly wobbly shapes.

I don't have any neat answers for you, because I don't think there are any. The gospel is my bottom line, and if you are a Christian, it should be yours too. Personally, I am utterly convinced of the five Solas too. I suppose my problem is when I try and narrow it down to 'essentials', I find that actually, what is basic is a lot bigger than it's often made out to be.

The charismatic issue jumps out at me as a proper secondary issue, but then that cuts to the heart of what we believe about the Bible. The same with the vexed question of women pastors.

I suppose the best way to move forward is for each of us to be concerned primarily with truth in all it's fullness, rather than trying to shave off what is a cause of disagreement, because the end of that road is well-meaning but deadly universalism. I think I might read Pilgrim's Progress again.

More on Dr Mohler...

But no cross-cultural advice this time, just hearty approval of his latest post about the visit of the Pope to America.

His position is identical to my own, especially in light of the recent re-affirmation by the Pope of the official Roman Catholic belief that it is the one true church. I blogged briefly on that at the time.

I found the comment section of the actual online column very interesting, but not tremendously surprising, edifying, or even challenging. Just a round of atheist unpleasantness, the standard Catholic apologetics about the ever-increasing number of 'Protestant denominations' (yawn), some ecumenical Christians being very snooty about the (as usual) un-hysterical Dr Mohler and not a lot else. Read the post, don't bother with the comments, they're dispiriting.

My own thoughts on the visit? Well, erm, not much, to be honest. Mild bemusement at the extraordinary lauding of him among my Catholic friends, endeavouring to take note of what he may say on the news, and trying to correct a few of the misunderstandings my non-Christian friends and family have about his role in Christendom.

(And am I allowed to suggest that Dr Mohler's use of 'breach' in his article isn't quite right? :D )

on a martyr and stubborn blindness

This sort of reporting is exactly why the liberal establishment is never going to grasp why Islamic terrorists do what they do.

Note, the man's wife says he was shot for 'his Christian beliefs'. Yes, that's a quote from her, but putting it in quote marks like that gives an impression of incredulity on the part of those reporting it.

It's completely in the public domain that Islam requires the death of anyone who converts to another faith. It was headline news some time ago with the case of Abdul Rahman in Afghanistan. Yet the article puts this information in the mouth of Margaret Ali, thereby pushing it away from the purely factual (which it is) and making it 'opinion'.

It's this obfuscation that will continue to lull the elites into their cosy fantasy that if only we can find out what the terrorists want, we can make them stop. If only we can give them the land they want, or give them privileges in our country, or be very, very nice to them, they will stop killing us.

But this kind of appeasement is missing the point. To the Islamist, this is a religious and ideological war. This is why 'apostasy' is a crime punishable by death for them. It's a rejection of the very thing that drives them.

Failing to face up to this means we're going to be forever chasing our tails trying to soothe away 'grievances', when we should grasp the reality that the reason they are attacking the West is because we're not submitting to Allah. It's really that simple.

Now, that aside, let's give thanks to God for our brother's witness in Somalia, and pray for his wife to be comforted and upheld at such a difficult time. He gets a martyr's crown.

A snapshot of my children's faith.

So, there's Eden, who has already been a guest blogger on the pink blog, and very well she did, too. She is currently pondering whether or not she is a Christian, based on something she picked up from church on Sunday.

She is deeply concerned that, although she trusts that Jesus took her sins when He died on the cross, she still sins. She's spending a lot of time in prayer about it, because she wants to be very sure that she really does trust in Him.

We had a chat in which I asked her if I sin. She was happy to affirm that I do. I told her that, despite that, I was convinced that I was a Christian, and explained about santification.

I don't want to give her false assurance, and I don't want to make her despair either. After all, these wrestlings with realities of our sinfulness are precisely what drive us to the cross in the first place. But it's a challenging thing to parent a child through that sort of soul-searching. Especially when they're not yet seven.

Then there is Constance. Connie is both a clown and very precise and deliberate thinker. She is beginning to really engage with spiritual things, and is particularly keen on the idea of the broad and the narrow way. She told me the other day that she thinks the way to the broad way is by the shops.

Her prayers are becoming more thoughtful, and have been addressed to 'Farger dod' for sometime. I shall be quite sorry when she begins to get it right, actually, it's very charming and so earnestly said. She used to pray 'In Jean genie' as well, but thankfully she's learned the accurate version now.

My favourite part of her prayers is when she thanks God for His 'grayshuns and blessings', which she does without fail. She's stopped thanking God specifically for the ingredients during grace, which is a bit disappointing but does save time.

Aurelia has been persuaded to join in bedtime prayers now. She puts her hands together, burbles a lot and every 6th burble will be a discernable family name, rounded off with an emphatic 'Amen!' at the end, and an enormous cheeky grin of accomplishment.

Reuben likes to 'rev up' on all fours, and makes a particular noise like The Fonz from Happy Days when he sees his Daddy, but I'm confident there's nothing significantly spiritual about that.