Kevin DeYoung's Blog, page 124

Monday Morning Humor

No, the previous post on polling was not meant to be Monday Morning Humor. But I know some of you need your MMH fix, so here are a few seconds with a dog and a vegetable that should warm your heart.

The Polls Tell Us Less than We Think

I have a bold prediction for Tuesday: almost all the presidential polls out there (and there are LOTS of them) will prove to be accurate. And yet at this moment, no one really knows who will win.

The factor in these polls that most people forget about, or fail to understand, is the statistical concept “margin of error.” Most Americans give too much credence to surveys (64% of likely voters know that). It’s not that the polls are rigged (at least not most of them). The polls are often found to be “inaccurate” because we expect them to be more “accurate” than they claim to be. Every presidential poll has a margin of error (MoE), which is the pollster’s way of saying “here’s the statistical range we feel confident about.” But if we ignore the MoE, or misapply it, we will not know what the poll is really saying.

For example, let’s look at the latest presidential polls taken in Michigan:

Baydoun/Foster – 1913 LV, 2.2 MoE, Obama 46, Romney 47

PPP – 700 LV, 3.7 MoE, Obama 52, Romney 46

Rasmussen – 750 LV, 4.0 MoE, Obama 52, Romney 47

Detroit News – 600 LV, 4.0 MoE, Obama 48, Romney 45

EPIC-MRA – 600 LV, 4.0 MoE, Obama 48, Romney 42

The margin of error indicates the range (plus or minus the given number) that will be true 95% of the time. The 95% figure comes into play, though it rarely gets mentioned, because it is the standard confidence interval. It means, in the Detroit News poll for example, that if they ran the same survey 100 times, in 95 of those times Obama would get 48% of the voter preference, plus or minus 4 points. This indicates the range of percentages about which the pollster feels confident. The Detroit News is confident (or at least was when the poll was taken) that somewhere between 44% and 52% of the likely voters prefer Obama. Or to put it another way, they think 19 out of 20 polls (i.e., the 95% confidence interval) will have Obama’s percentage between 44-52 and Romney’s between 41-49.

Make sense? I hope so because I want to make a few other important observations about MoE.

1. The margin of error does not refer to the gap between two candidates in the polls but to the polling numbers for each candidate. The /- range is for the percentages themselves, not for the difference between the two percentages. So if Romney leads Obama by 6 percentage points in Florida (51-45 in a recent poll) and the margin of error is plus or minus 3.5, the poll does not give Romney a decisive edge. True, it’s better to have the polls say you are ahead than behind, but what the poll indicates is that 95% of the time this survey should show Romney with 47.5-54.5 percent of the vote and Obama with 41.5-48.5 percent of the vote. The MoE refers to the percentages, not to the gap. So according to this Florida poll Obama might squeak out a 1 point win in Florida or Romney could cruise to a double digit victory.

2. Remember that the MoE has a confidence interval of 95 percent. This means 1 out 20 times you are going to get a strange outlier. If you’ve seen a wild poll or two in this election season that’s way out there compared to almost every other poll, that’s what pollsters expect. Five percent of the time the poll will be really different, not necessarily wrong, just really different.

3. Because of the MoE, polls tell us less than we think, even though candidates want to make more of them than they should. Look again at the Michigan polls above. The top one is the most recent and the bottom one less recent (in this case, only a week earlier). The Romney camp could say, “Look, we have the momentum in Michigan!” On the other hand, the Obama camp could say, “Look, we’ve been ahead in this state for months and every other poll is in our favor!” In reality, the polls say that the state is too close to call. In none of these polls is Obama’s range without overlap with Romney’s range. Obama fans should not think they have Michigan in the bag. Everyone of these polls says that Romney could actually be ahead of Obama. And yet, Romney fans should simmer down too. The latest poll with Romney up by 1 point is exactly what every other poll said was possible 95 times out of 100. It may not indicate momentum at all.

All this is to suggest that in this season’s plethora of polls pundits have been too quick to make big conclusions and rewrite campaigns narratives based on a recent poll which, given the margin of error, may say pretty much the same thing as the last poll.

The national polling indicates a dead heat, and in 10 or 12 battleground states the polls are too close to call. You can make a case that Obama will win handily, that Romney will make a good showing in several blue states but hasn’t broken through in the polls and will fall short in almost all of them. You can also make the case for a big Romney win, that last minute voters will break for the the challenger and Obama will lose almost every state where his numbers have been below 50 percent.

And it could be as close as Bush-Gore in 2000. Tuesday will tell.

Unless it really is Bush-Gore all over again.

Preaching Matters

Preaching Matters is a monthly series designed to equip, inspire and encourage those who preach or teach God’s word. Each month the folks at St. Helen’s Bishopgate in London sit down for a chat with a preacher and ask them their thoughts. The series will include video interviews with William Taylor, Andrew Sach, Phillip Jensen and David Cook.

The monthly video’s will be released on the first Monday of each month. It will be available from their website  but also though Vimeo and You Tube.

I have included three of the initial releases below as an introduction.

PREACHING MATTERS: AN INTRODUCTION from St Helen’s Church on Vimeo.

CHARLIE SKRINE: CELEBRITY PREACHERS (1 CORINTHIANS) from St Helen’s Church on Vimeo.

WILLIAM TAYLOR: LUKE PART 1 from St Helen’s Church on Vimeo.

Politics Is Hell

Imagine your life were an open book.

Every conversation recorded. Every errant word written down. Every gaffe broadcast before all.

What if everything you ever did was fair game?

What if every action and every decision were held up to the severest scrutiny?

What if all your last minute apologies failed to satisfy?

How would you feel to realize someone knew everything about your past? And someone was chronicling everything about your present?

How would you like to face a barrage of questions for every inconsistency in your life?

What a fearful proposition: anything you ever say or ever do can, and often will, be held against you. If an adversary so desired, he could paint an ugly picture of any of us. And without resorting to lies.

It’s a scary thought to think that your whole life could be an open book. With defenses that do not hold, and sorry’s that do not stick, and excuses which only make things worse.

That’s politics.

And that’s the day of judgment without the blood of Christ.

Five Key Concepts in the Reformation Understanding of Justification

On October 31, 1517, Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses concerning clerical abuses and indulgences on the church door at Wittenberg. This famous event is often considered that launching point for the Protestant Reformation.

The chief concern for Luther and the other reformers was the doctrine of justification. It was, to use Calvin’s language, the main hinge on which religion turns.” And the doctrine of justification is no less important today than it was 500 years ago.

There are five key concepts every Protestant should grasp if they are to understanding the reformer’s (and the Bible’s) doctrine of justification.

First, the Christian is simul iustus et peccator. This is Martin Luther’s famous Latin phrase which means “At the same time, justified and a sinner.” The Catechism powerfully reminds us that even though we are right with God, we still violate his commands, feel the sting of conscience, and battle against indwelling sin. On this side of the consummation, we will always be sinning saints, righteous wretches, and on occasion even justified jerks. God does not acquit us of our guilt based upon our works, but because we trust “him who justifies the ungodly” (Rom. 4:5).

Second, our right standing with God is based on an alien righteousness. Alien doesn’t refer to an E.T. spirituality. It means we are justified because of a righteousness that is not our own. I am not right with God because of my righteousness, but because “the perfect satisfaction, righteousness, and holiness of Christ” has been credited to me. “Nothing in my hands I bring, simply to thy cross I cling; naked, come to thee for dress; helpless, look to thee for grace; foul, I to the Fountain fly; wash me, Savior, or I die” wrote August Toplady in the old hymn. We contribute nothing to our salvation. The name by which every Christian must be called is “The Lord is our righteousness” (Jer. 23:6).

Third, the righteousness of Christ is ours by imputation, not by impartation. That is to say, we are not made holy, or infused with goodness as if we possessed it in ourselves, but rather Christ’s righteousness is credited to our account.

Fourth, we are justified by faith alone. The Catholic Church acknowledged that the Christian was saved by faith; it was the alone part they wouldn’t allow. In fact, the Council of Trent from the 16th century Catholic counter-reformation declared anathema those who believe in either justification by imputation or justification by faith alone. But evangelical faith has always held that “all I need to do is accept the gift of God with a believing heart.” True, justifying faith must show itself in good works. That’s what James 2 is all about. But these works serve as corroborating evidence, not as the ground of our justification. We are justified by faith without deeds of the law (Rom. 3:28; Titus 3:5). The gospel is “believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved” (Acts 16:30-31), not “believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and cooperate with transforming grace and you shall be saved.” There is nothing we contribute to our salvation but our sin, no merit we bring but Christ’s, and nothing necessary for justification except for faith alone.

Finally, with all this talk about the necessity of faith, the Catechism explains that faith is only an instrumental cause in our salvation. In other words, faith is not what God finds acceptable in us. In fact, strictly speaking, faith itself does not justify. Faith is only the instrument by which we embrace Christ, have communion with him, and share in all his benefits. It is the object of our faith that matters. If you venture out on to a frozen pond, it isn’t your faith that keeps you from crashing into the water. True, it takes faith to step onto the pond, but it it’s the object of your faith, the twelve inches of ice, that keeps you safe. Believe in Christ with all your heart, but don’t put your faith in your faith. Your experience of trusting Christ will ebb and flow. So be sure to rest in Jesus Christ and not your faith in him. He alone is the one who died for our sakes and was raised for our justification. Believe this, and you too will be saved.

A Hobbit Halloween

Do Men Mother?

Are mothers and fathers more or less the same? Do mothers “father” as well as fathers? Do fathers “mother” as well as mothers?

While we may know single parents doing their best to “father” and “mother” at the same time and we may know stay-at-home dads who seems to be flourishing, personal experience suggests that moms and dads are far from interchangeable. Stand up comics wouldn’t be able to make us laugh with their wry observations if men and women weren’t so different.

God’s design for the family is for a husband and a wife to fill different, but complementary, roles in the home. Even from nature we can see that God designed our sexual organs so that reproduction would involve a man and a woman. The raising of children is intended to be a couples-project, with a father and a mother excelling in different ways.

Men, for example, do not make good mothers. This is the subject of a recent article by Jenet Erickson in Public Discourse.

Are fathers and mothers really the same? Do mothers “father” and do fathers “mother” in the same way the other would do?

Canadian scholar, Andrea Doucet, has explored this question in her book Do Men Mother? Her extensive research with 118 male primary caregivers, including stay-at-home dads, led her to conclude that fathers do not “mother.” And that’s a good thing. Although mothering and fathering have much in common, there were persistent, critical differences that were important for children’s development.

To begin, fathers more often used fun and playfulness to connect with their children. No doubt, many a mother has wondered why her husband can’t seem to help himself from “tickling and tossing” their infant—while she stands beside him holding her breath in fear. And he can’t understand why all she wants to do is “coo and cuddle.” Yet as Doucet found, playfulness and fun are often critical modes of connection with children—even from infancy.

Fathers also more consistently made it a point to get their children outdoors to do physical activities with them. Almost intuitively they seemed to know that responding to the physical and developmental needs of their children was an important aspect of nurturing.

When fathers responded to children’s emotional hurts, they differed from mothers in their focus on fixing the problem rather than addressing the hurt feeling. While this did not appear to be particularly “nurturing” at first, the seeming “indifference” was useful— particularly as children grew older. They would seek out and share things with their dads precisely because of their measured, problem-solving responses. The “indifference” actually became a strategic form of nurturing in emotionally-charged situations.

Fathers were also more likely to encourage children’s risk taking—whether on the playground, in school work, or in trying new things. While mothers typically discouraged risk-taking, fathers guided their children in deciding how much risk to take and encouraged them in it. At the same time, fathers were more attuned to developing a child’s physical, emotional, and intellectual independence—in everything from children making their own lunches and tying their own shoes to doing household chores and making academic decisions.

Erickson concludes that the arguments for genderless parenting fall flat. Moms are not as good as dads; and dads are not as good as moms. Children need both. God can certainly give all sorts of grace to single parent families, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t strive for the design that nature, Scripture, and even scholarship says is the best.

Arguments for the non-essential father may reflect an effort to accept the reality that many children today grow up without their dads. But surely a more effective and compassionate approach would be to acknowledge the unique contributions of both mothers and fathers in their children’s lives, and then do what we can to ensure that becomes a reality for more children.

There may be something to the old-fashioned idea of manhood and womanhood after all.

Monday Morning Humor

Thought of this commercial while my wife has been out of town.

Parenting my children also makes me think of this:

 

Ain’t No Sunshine When She’s Gone

It’s that time of year again. My wife has left for a long weekend to California to visit her college girlfriends. And she left the kids behind! I’m glad she can go, but still…

Let Pastors be Pastors

Recently I was talking with a ministry friend of mine, a man I like and respect. He loves the lost and wants to see churches make an impact in their communities. He has gifts and insights that I can learn from.

But I was caught off guard by something he said about Ephesians 4:11. He argued that for too long we’ve trained pastors to be shepherds and teachers, when the time has now come to train them to be apostles, prophets, and evangelists. The second half of verse 11 might have worked in a different time, but in today’s world we need ministers who more resemble the first half of the verse. His point was that we have lots of pastors who are well-equipped to care for the flock and teach the finer points of doctrine, but precious few who can exercise dynamic leadership and get into the community to make a difference and build the kingdom.

I’ve heard these arguments many times, in pockets of the church that are conservative and evangelical, and sometimes in pockets of the church more or less reformed. No one says that teaching is a waste or that doctrine can be ignored. But the general sentiment is that good preaching and congregational care are pretty well taken care of. What we really need are innovators, visionary-leaders, entrepreneurs, and community change-agents. The nature of pastoral ministry accounts for much of what divides the evangelical world, and even the smaller tribe of the new Calvinists. I don’t mean “divide” in a nasty schismatic way (though I suppose that happens too). I simply mean that you can get a group of pastors together who share almost all the same theology, but hardly agree on anything about “doing church” because they don’t have the same roles and goals in mind for pastoral ministry. Often these disagreements go unstated and simmer below the surface, and good Christians wonder what the hang up really is.

Let me a venture a few reflections on this disagreement, the nature of pastoral ministry, and Ephesians 4:11 in particular.

God gifts some people to be innovators, visionary-leaders, entrepreneurs, and community change-agents. We should be thankful for Christians who love people and serve their cities in that way.
These kinds of gifts can be especially useful for church planters and those working in places with few Christians around. If “apostle” means the ability to start a new thing in a new place, and “prophet” means the ability to speak into our culture, and “evangelist” means the ability to connect with non-Christians, then these are gifts many pastors would do very well to have and to cultivate. Different pastors will excel in different areas of ministry. Some will excel in turning things around, some in wading through conflict, some in keeping a good thing going, and others in starting from scratch. In a country where the religious “nones” continue to rise, pastors need to see their communities may be changing in ways that significantly affect their ministries.
Having said all that, we should not read our own definitions into important biblical terminology. While there may be apostle-like gifts and prophet-like gifts, Paul considered the office of apostle and the office of prophet to be uniquely foundational in the life of the church (2:20; 3:5). Paul didn’t say that Christ gave to the church some people who start things and some people who speak in the culture and some people who connect with non-Christians. Those may all be good things and even gifts from the Spirit, but we shouldn’t assume our commonsense notions of pastoral training are what Paul had in mind by these specific offices.
It’s telling that the office of pastor/elder/overseer is described chiefly as one of shepherding and teaching (Acts 20:28; 1 Tim. 5:17; 1 Peter 5:2; cf. John 21:16). Timothy is also told to “do the work of an evangelist” (2 Tim. 4:5), though the context suggests public preaching rather than a vague sense of being able to connect with non-Christians. If we read through the New Testament, and especially the pastoral epistles, we must conclude that responsibility of the pastor is not to cast vision or start new programs or even to engage with the community. His main responsibility is to shepherd the flock entrusted under his care, proclaim Christ, and faithfully pass on the apostolic teaching.
It’s also worth noticing what the four (or five) offices listed in Ephesians 4:11 all have in common. They all assume teaching gifts and are teaching offices. The apostles and prophets were the foundational teachers, the evangelists were (perhaps) itinerant teachers, and the shepherd-teachers were the pastors teaching in the local congregation. In one sense, the offices do not vary all that much. Christ’s singular gift to the church is in providing men who can boldly, clearly, and persuasively teach the whole counsel of God.
Which brings me to my final point and the title of this post: let pastors be pastors. There are men who want to love a church, lead their fellow elders, and preach solid sermons. And yet, they feel like they don’t have the entrepreneurial gifts or visionary personality to cut it in today’s church. They may still be called to pastoral ministry. Conversely, there are men entering the pastorate because they have great gifts for making things happen and great passion for changing their communities, but they should not be pastors because they cannot teach and have little patience for loving an actual congregation. I’m not at all convinced that our pastors are prepared to preach good sermons and shepherd a congregation. But even if we’ve been nailing this training for fifty years, it doesn’t make the continuing need any less real. Pastoral ministry as God describes it may not seem particularly relevant or cutting edge. But if we truly love our people, keep watch over their souls, and preach the word of God week after week, I’m willing to bet God’s people will be the entrepreneurial, cultural-engaging, community-shaping people we want them to be. We just have to get our calling squared away first.