H. Henry Williams

Illiterate and Misguided

I use prayer cards in my personal devotions. It's an idea I got from one of the best books I've ever read on prayer, A Praying Life by Paul Miller. One of those cards is focused on Five Oaks. I don't list immediate needs on it. I don't need to write those down. I have four big prayers. One is for the people who walk through our doors and stay. I pray that they develop a biblical worldview and biblical literacy within three years of joining our church family. I pray this almost every day.

I don't need to review the statistics. Most people today lack a strong, spiritual foundation, including those sitting in churches who are simply hoping for a shot of spiritual adrenaline to keep them going for the next week. They are mostly biblically illiterate and misguided for lack of a biblical worldview. It's why I developed the Story of God series and now the Story of God small group for people who missed the series or were unable to fully engage at that time. And it's why we're offering Five Oaks U courses that help us take the message deep into our hearts and into our lives.

Will you pray with me for this? Will you encourage others to engage in their own spiritual growth? Are you modeling it for others?

Five Oaks U: "Spiritual Parenting"

Check out this promo video and read the description below.

Spiritual Parenting

It’s hard enough to train kids to behave, but good behavior isn’t what Jesus calls for in the Bible. He wants hearts and souls that are shaped in vibrant faith and love toward
God and others. How can parents cultivate this in their children? Spiritual Parenting is a six-part DVD series that empowers parents to be the primary nurturers of their children’s faith and teach them how to create a home environment that God can use to work in their children’s lives. Your family can be transformed when you learn how to create space for God-encounters in everyday life.

• Dates: Six Weeks - Sundays, Sept. 25, Oct. 2, 9, 16, 23, 30
• Time: 9:30am
• Location: Woodbury Campus
• Instructor: Dave Runion and Nicole Schwarz
• Cost: $15 per household
• Registration: Register by linking here
  

Faculty

Dave Runion has been at Five Oaks for approximately ten years and have served as volunteers in multiple capacities. As a Children’s Ministries teacher, small group leader and small group coach he has loved seeing kids and adults grow in their faith. He has been married to Emmy for 13 years. They have 3 children, Grace, Micah and Joey. As a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, Dave gets the honor of walking alongside individuals and families through life’s journey. Co-teaching with David is Nicole Schwarz who is also a long time Five Oaks member who is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist.

Five Oaks U: "Doing the Right Thing"

Watch the promo video and read the description below.

Doing the Right Thing (Making Moral Choices in a World Full of Options)

“Doing the Right Thing” explores the ethical and moral breakdown that is hitting culture from all sides, how Christians should think about ethics and how to respond in a way that is winsome and Christ-like. Each session consists of a 30-minute video and a 30-minute group discussion. The videos are produced by The Chuck Colson Center for Christian Worldview and are hosted by Brit Hume, Chuck Colson, Robert George and other distinguished panelists. Through panel discussions, interviews, and live student questions it raises ethical issues in a non-condemning but challenging way, stimulating thought, discussion, and action. The classroom discussion that follows focuses on how ethical and character issues relate to life at home, school, and the workplace.

• Dates: Six Weeks - Sundays, Sept. 25, Oct. 2, 9, 16, 23, 30
• Time: 9:30am
• Location: Woodbury Campus
• Instructor: Amy Evans
• Cost: $15 per person
• Registration: Online by linking here

Faculty

Amy Evans has been married to Chris for fourteen years and they have three girls (Mia 7, Kayla 5, Lela 3). The Evans family visited Five Oaks shortly after the Hudson Campus opened the doors. For those who remember it, the billboard on I94 worked and they have been part of Five Oaks ever since. Amy is an Assistant Professor for Liberty University’s Center for Counseling and Family Studies online program. She likes teaching in her pajamas, but promises not to show up in them on a Sunday morning!

Five Oaks U (Woodbury Campus)

Five Oaks U is back and we're offering four courses--three on Sunday morning and one on Sunday evening. All the classes start on September 25th. The U focuses on topics that will help you grow deeper roots for your faith by helping you develop a biblical worldview and lifestyle. It's a great opportunity to grow, but it is not intended to take the place of a small group in your life. Over the next few days I will introduce you to the classes that are being offered this fall quarter.

John Piper's Take on The Purpose Driven Life

This is John Piper's short take on The Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren after an in-depth analysis of the book and after reading many of its critiques.

“Frankly, I’m appalled at the kinds of slanders that have been brought against this book by people whose methods of critique, if they were consistently applied to the Bible, would undo it as the Word of God."

"I'm one of these Reformed types. My type tends to get on your case pretty often. And when I read the book, I thought, 'What's the issue here?'"

You can watch Piper's 1.5 hour interview of Warren by linking here.

Top Book I Read in 2011

 

Okay, The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skeptism by Tim Keller is the only book I've read this year (and I read most of it in 2010), but I don't think I'll read anything better this year. The first half takes on some of the big faith issues: 

1. There Can't Be Just One True Religion
2. How Could a Good God Allow Suffering?
3. Christianity Is a Straitjacket
4. The Church Is Responsible for So Much Injustice
5. How Can a Loving God Send People to Hell?
6. Science Has Disproved Christianity
7. You Can't Take the Bible Literally

What I love about this book is that Keller's manner and method of addressing these issues is as informative as his answers. He is respectful at every turn yet manages to challenge and raise questions that skeptics (and our own skeptical minds) would rather avoid or simply neglect to ask.

The second half of the book builds a case for Christianity.

8. The Clues of God
9. The Knowledge of God
10. The Problem of Sin
11. Religion and the Gospel
12. The (True) Story of the Cross
13. The Reality of the Resurrection
14. The Dance of God

There is depth and insight here that I'll return to over and over again. I'm afraid I'll be quoting or stealing (I mean, borrowing) ideas from Keller way too much. I'll have to resort to saying "someone has said" and "I read somewhere" so as not to overuse his name. (Maybe I shouldn't have told anyone that.) Anyway, I highly recommend it.

This is also my number one recommendation as a book to give to a skeptic who likes to read and is willing to think. For those of you who have long commutes or spend a lot of time on a treadmill or stationary bike, consider the unabridged audio version. 

 

Sex and the City

Tim Keller on ministry in global urban centers:

People living in urban centers are not only very sexually active but also very insistent that their sexuality is nobody else's business but theirs. Even strong Christians will be tempted to be sexually active in various ways that can undermine or destroy their spiritual effectiveness. Ministry implications include the following:

• A lack of prudishness in talking about sex. A strong teaching emphasis on the Christian understanding of sex, in which sex was designed for lifetime
• commitment and community building instead of personal gratification.
• Teaching that is smart, sensitive, irenic, nuanced, and carefully assimilates existing cultural narratives about freedom, identity, and community within the confines of biblical teaching.

More on "More Information Might Surprise You"

Below is an example of my point in last weekend's message that more information might surprise you. I said that you might be surprised by what many people who attack the reliability of the Bible believe in and don’t believe in. If you knew their assumptions about life, you might be more careful about agreeing with their conclusions on Scripture. This is from a review of Bill Maher's film attacking faith (of all kinds), Religulous:

He also loses credibility by sheer fact that he is Bill Maher—an ardently liberal, slightly greasy elitist with a penchant for condescension. Maher doesn't help break the "out of touch liberal" stereotype when he smokes pot on camera, for instance. And on Larry King Live in August, Maher exposed his amoral approach to life when he defended John Edwards' extramarital affair, saying, "people like new; you can't stop human nature." This "anything goes" view of adultery is doubtless not an opinion many people share with Maher.

More on the Reliability of the Bible

Lee Strobel has an interesting web site with short videos on a number of topics related to the field of apologetics. Here's one he has on a topic someone raised with me after the service this morning. This person had seen the Bill Maher's new film, Religulous, and he admits it shook him up a bit. (Here's a review from Christianity Today.)

The issue is whether central features of Christianity were taken/borrowed/stolen from popular myths. This question is actually quite complex since a historically based faith will take shape in that culture's language and philosophy. It will borrow language and images that help communicate it's central message with the world of its day. In addition, myths can often reflect God revealed truths that have been "corrupted" in that culture over time. And there are other issues as well. But Strobel does a good job of dealing quickly with a very complex topic in a short time (about five minutes).

I've removed the embedded video since it starts up by itself and doesn't shut up. You can watch it here.

God on Trial

Chuck Colson's BreakPoint from Monday deals with the topic of suffering. Here are the highlights (go here for the whole commentary):

God on Trial
He Suffers with Us
November 24, 2008

PBS stations around the country are currently running a deeply sobering film that is a must-see for people of faith. Called God on Trial, the film tells the story of a group of Jewish inmates at Auschwitz who don’t understand why God seems indifferent to their suffering. (Because of profanity, disturbing images, and other elements, the film is not suitable for children.)

The film begins on the “day of selection,” on which some of the prisoners are chosen for extermination to make room for more prisoners. As the chosen ones await their fate...A young man named Moche complains, “[God] should be here, not us. . . . We should put [Him] on trial; then maybe He’ll hear us.”

So the prisoners decide to bring a charge of “breach of contract” against God for breaking His covenant with the Jewish people. What follows is a compelling exploration of suffering, sin, and faith.

...The arguments are hard to hear and the film is very hard to watch. Not because we haven’t heard arguments against God before—many of us have been hearing them and debating them for years—but because we hear them in a situation like this, among men who have so much at stake. As one character remarks, appeals to reason mean little in a world that seems to be run by madness.

But this makes it all the more meaningful when, even though they cannot understand God, they realize how desperately they need Him. One young father who had his three little boys taken from him surprisingly speaks in favor of God: “I know He is here, even though I don’t understand Him. . . . Maybe God is suffering with us.” Even when they feel furthest from Him, God is embodied in the sacrificial love of some of the prisoners.

...I recommend that you watch the film if it airs on your local PBS station, or pick up a copy of the DVD, which will be released in January...