Kevin DeYoung's Blog, page 14

A Tale of Two Numbers

There are two numbers in the life of the church that are too often miles apart. Although there are legitimate reasons why one number would be generally greater than the other. There is almost no good reason why there should be a vast gulf between the two figures.

The two numbers I have in mind are the church’s membership and the church’s worship attendance.

I’m a numbers guy. I love to look at well-organized charts, graphs, and figures. So I’ve always been a sucker for my denomination’s annual statistical tables–first in the RCA and now in the PCA. You only have to spend a few minutes in such tables to realize that most churches have more members than they typically have people on Sunday morning. I’m sure this is a phenomenon not unique to Reformed and Presbyterian denominations (although the numbers were closer together in the RCA because we had to pay assessments on our members). I know the same thing happens in Methodist churches, Baptist churches, and probably every other kind of church.

It’s no surprise that the two numbers do not exactly match, and within reason it’s not a big deal. If you have 80 members and average 65 people on Sunday, that’s fine. There’s no exact formula, but a 10-20% variance feels reasonable (although the variance gets more pronounced the bigger the church–if you have 4000 members, and average 20% less than that on a Sunday, you have 800 people to account for). But we all know churches (maybe our own church!) where the gap between membership and attendance is vast: a membership of 600 with an attendance of 150, or an impressive membership of 5,000 with 1,800 on most Sundays. This should not be.

Granted, there are a number of legitimate reasons why some members would not be present on Sunday. Your church may have shut-ins, college students, snow birds, missionaries, and helping professions (like doctors, nurses, police officers, and firefighters) who, understandably, are missing from worship (at their home church) on many Sundays. You may also have volunteers in the nursery and kids scattered across various classes (if you count covenant children as members). Add that all up and you have a legitimate gap.

But not a massive gap. In most churches, those categories don’t add up to a large percentage of the church. And besides, most churches have a host of non-members (e..g, students, visitors, grandparents, other friends and family) boosting their average attendance across the year. If your church is growing, such that there are more people on average in attendance than there are members, that’s fantastic. Keep the pipeline open to make those regular attenders faithful members. But setting aside that happy scenario, there should not be a large gap between a church’s membership and its average Sunday attendance.

Identifying the Problem

Why do so many churches have vastly more members than attenders on Sunday?

One reason is simple negligence. Some churches don’t manage their rolls carefully. They have adopted the Hotel California approach to church membership: you can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave. This is a mistake. Hebrews 13:17 tells us, “Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will have to give an account.” If our members have moved away, drifted away, or gone to another church, we owe it to them (and to ourselves) to make this new arrangement clear. We shouldn’t keep people as members who haven’t functioned as members for years.

Another reason for the gap is pride. It looks better in the denominational report or in the newspaper or on the website to say that First Presbyterian (or First Baptist or First Whatever) has a membership of 2,500 even if that number is from the glory days of yesteryear (and was probably a bit inflated back then too). I’m tempted by pride as much as the next pastor, but Hebrews 13:17 scares me too much to let pride get the best of me. I don’t want to be held accountable for a raft of people that haven’t been to my church in years.

An unhealthy view of membership is a third reason for the gap. Some members insist that they be kept on the roles for family reasons, professional reasons, or out mere tradition. Likewise, some churches think of membership as a marker in time rather than a vital, continuing commitment. In both cases, we need a better understanding of church membership.

So far, I’ve been laying most of the blame at the feet of pastors and elders. And rightly so, they are entrusted with overseeing the membership of the church (even in congregational polity, the officers lead the way). But there is a final reason for the gap between membership and attendance, and this one has everything to do with the members themselves. Increasingly, church members only attend their home church once or twice a month. On the one hand, this is to be expected in a society with cheap and easy mobility. Children visit their parents. Grandparents visit their grandkids. Numerous professions require frequent travel.

And yet, if we are honest, those aren’t the only reasons (or the main reasons) members attend church less frequently. Too many members are putting youth sports ahead of church. Others prioritize the beach or the mountains half of their weekends. And then there are those who simply consider church attendance a flexible requirement, one that need not come before football on Saturday night, sunshine on Sunday morning, or homework on Sunday afternoon. Consequently, a church of 500 may only have 300 of its members around for church on any given Sunday. Once you get to Easter, you can see the membership is full strength. This is an unfortunate capitulation to a consumer culture that has rendered the Lord’s Day, even among Christians, a matter of convenience rather than covenantal commitment.

Pastors and parishoners, there is much at stake in the gap between these two numbers. Let’s do what we can to bring them closer together.

Do the Ten Commandments Have Authority Over New Testament Christians?

One of the first and most recurring things my kids have learned–at Sunday school, in Christian school, and around the dinner table–has been the Ten Commandments. In fact, my middle three children love to sing (incessantly!) the Ten Commandments song they learned for last year’s choir concert. As a Presbyterian pastor–but more so, as a Christian–I consider it one of my most obvious responsibilities that I teach my kids the joyful responsibility of knowing and obeying the Ten Commandments.

Could it be that I, along with countless other Christian parents and pastors, am making a mistake?

In his new book Irresistible: Reclaiming the New that Jesus Unleashed for the World, Andy Stanley insists that “The Ten Commandments have no authority over you. None. To be clear: Thou shalt not obey the Ten Commandments” (136). Mike Kruger argues forcefully (and charitably) against this bold thesis. It will surprise no one to learn–especially given my new book–that when it comes to the role of the Ten Commandments specifically, and the Old Testament more broadly, I agree wholeheartedly with Kruger and disagree strongly with Stanley.

Against the Entire History of the Church

The church has historically put the Ten Commandments at the center of its teaching ministry, especially for children and new believers. For centuries, catechetical instruction was based on three things: the Apostles’ Creed, the Lord’s Prayer, and the Ten Commandments. In other words, for virtually all of church history, when people asked, “How do we do discipleship? How do we teach our kids about the Bible? What do new Christians need to know about Christianity?” their answers always included an emphasis on the Ten Commandments.

In the Heidelberg Catechism, for example, eleven of the fifty-two Lord’s Days focus on the Ten Commandments. The same is true in forty-two of the 107 questions in the Westminster Shorter Catechism, in more than half of the Lutheran Larger Catechism, and in 120 out of 750 pages of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. Across various traditions, there has been a historic emphasis on the Ten Commandments.

A Unique Place in the Old Testament

The Ten Commandments are not simply a part of the Mosaic covenant, they occupy a unique and central role in the law handed down on Sinai. We see this right from the prologue in Exodus 20. The Lord is no longer telling Moses to go down and relay a message to the people. That’s how the Lord operated in chapter 19, but now in chapter 20 God is speaking “all these words” (v. 1) directly to the Israelites. That’s why, at the end of the Ten Commandments, the people cry out to Moses, “You speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, lest we die” (Ex. 20:19). They were too terrified to have God speak to them without a mediator, which says something about the stunning display of God’s power in chapters 19 and 20 and underlines the importance of the Decalogue.

Moreover, the language in verse 2 is a deliberate echo of God’s call to Abraham. Look at the similarities:

“I am the Lord who brought you out from Ur of the Chaldeans.” (Gen. 15:7)

“I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt.” (Ex. 20:2)

At these great epochal moments in redemptive history—first with Abraham, and now with Moses and the people of Israel at the foot of Mount Sinai—God says, in effect, “I am the Lord who brought you out of this strange land to be your God and to give you this special word.”

Some people—including a number of good Old Testament scholars—will say, “Well, look, there are all sorts of commandments. The Ten Commandments are succinct, and they’ve played an important role in the history of the church, but they’re simply the introduction to the Mosaic law. There are hundreds of statutes in the Pentateuch, and the Bible never says these ten are in a class all by themselves.”

While it’s true that the Bible doesn’t say to print the Ten Commandments in boldface, we shouldn’t undersell their special stature in ancient Israel. They came from God as he spoke to the people face-to-face (Deut. 5:1–5), and they came from Mount Sinai amidst fire, cloud, thick darkness, and a loud voice (Deut. 5:22–27). Exodus 20 marks a literal and spiritual high point in the life of Israel. It’s no wonder the tablets of the law, along with the manna and Aaron’s staff, were placed inside the ark of the covenant (Heb. 9:4).

There will be many more laws in the Old Testament after Exodus 20. But these first ten are foundational for the rest. The Ten Commandments are like the constitution for Israel, and what follows are the regulatory statutes. The giving of the law changes sharply from chapter 20 to chapters 21 and 22. The Ten Commandments are clear, definite, absolute standards of right and wrong. Once you get to chapter 21, we shift to application. You can see the distinctive language leading off each paragraph in chapters 21 and 22: words such as “when,” “whoever,” and “if.” This is the case law meant to apply the constitutional provisions carved in stone on Mount Sinai.

In other words, from the very outset of Israel’s formal existence as a nation, the Ten Commandments had a special place in establishing the rules for their life together.

Part of the New Jesus Unleashed for the World

Contrary to Stanley’s claim above, the Ten Commandments are not just important in the Old Testament; they are also central to the ethics of the New Testament.

Think of Mark 10:17, for example. This is where the rich young ruler comes to Jesus and asks, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus says to him, “You know the commandments.” Then he lists the second table of the law, the commandments that relate to our neighbors: “Do not murder, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Do not defraud, Honor your father and mother” (v. 19). Jesus isn’t laying out a path for earning eternal life. We know from the rest of the story that Jesus is setting the young man up for a fall, because the one command he obviously hasn’t obeyed is the one command Jesus skips—do not covet (vv. 20–22). But it is noteworthy that when Jesus has to give a convenient summary of our neighborly duties, he goes straight to the Ten Commandments.

We see something similar in Romans 13. When the apostle Paul wants to give a summary of what it means to be a Christian living in obedience to God, he looks to the Ten Commandments:

Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up in this word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” (Rom. 13:8–9)

Paul says, much like Jesus did, that the Ten Commandments are the way for God’s people to love one another. When we love, we fulfill the commandments, and when we obey the commandments, we are fulfilling the law of love.

Paul does something similar in 1 Timothy 1. After establishing that the law is good if one uses it lawfully (v. 8), Paul proceeds in verses 9 and 10 to rattle through the second table of the law, referring to the wicked “who strike their fathers and mothers” (a violation of the fifth commandment), and “murderers” (a violation of the sixth commandment), and the sexually immoral and men who practice homosexuality (violations of the seventh commandment), and “enslavers” (a violation of the eighth commandment), and liars and perjurers (violations of the ninth commandment). Again, when Paul needs a recognizable way to summarize ethical instruction for the people of God, he goes back to the Ten Commandments.

By Jewish tradition, there are 613 laws in the Pentateuch. They all matter because they all teach us something about love for God and neighbor. But the 613 can be summarized by the Ten Commandments, which can in turn be summarized by two: love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind, and love your neighbor as yourself (see Matt. 22:37–40). To be sure, Jesus certainly transforms the Ten Commandments, but he never meant to abolish them (Matt. 5:17).

The Ten Commandments have been central to God’s people in the Old Testament, central to God’s people in the New Testament, central to God’s people throughout church history, and they should be central for us as well.

Portions of this blog post have been adapted from The Ten Commandments: What They Mean, Why They Matter, and Why We Should Obey Them.

Three Myths about the Enlightenment

There are certain intellectual tropes—so lazy, so predictable, and so overblown—that they serve the useful purpose of indicating that the author likely doesn’t really know what he’s talking about. I’m thinking of those who wax eloquent about Greek ways of thinking versus Hebrew ways of thinking. Or those who imagine there is no societal ill that can’t be helped by swapping out propositions for stories. Or those who think the bogeyman of individualism is to blame for pretty much everything.

You can add to that list those who make unbending and simplistic assertions about the capital-E Enlightenment.

On the one hand, secularists sometimes speak of the Enlightenment as that golden age where open-minded reason triumphed over religious bigotry and science came to save us all.

On the other hand, believers (of all stripes, but I’m thinking especially of evangelical Christians) sometimes use the Enlightenment as a pseudo-intellectual explanation for whatever they don’t like. Syllogistic reasoning? Logical deduction? Biblical inerrancy? That’s Enlightenment garbage. Systematic theology? Proof-texting? Doctrinal boundaries? Nothing but Enlightenment Who Hash. In the minds of many Christians, the Enlightenment transformed the church into a sorry collection of freeze-dried, left-brained, buttoned-up rationalists.

But before we offer “the Enlightenment” as an explanation for anything, we must disabuse ourselves of a few common myths.

Myth #1: The Enlightenment was one big thing.

While scholars still disagree about the extent of diversity and plurality in the Enlightenment project, there is a broad consensus that we should not allow French expressions of the Enlightenment to dominate an intellectual conversation that spanned several centuries and most of the Western world. Jonathan Israel, for example, argues for two Enlightenments: a moderate mainstream Enlightenment that often reinforced conservative traditions and institutions but which revised traditional theology—the Enlightenment of John Locke, Gottfried Leibniz, and the Scottish Moderates—and a Radical Enlightenment that found clearest expression in Baruch Spinoza and led to the emergence of liberal modernity and the rejection of religious authority. David Van Kley, to cite another important scholar, insists on seven Enlightenments, while others in the field see the Enlightenment as having national contours (e.g., a French Enlightenment, a Scottish Enlightenment, an English Enlightenment, an American Enlightenment).

The point is, when someone says “the Enlightenment” you have to ask, “Which one? And what do you mean?” This is not to suggest there are no leading characteristics of the Enlightenment. I would argue that the Enlightenment was marked fundamentally by two beliefs: (1) a belief that people were seeing things that others in darker times hadn’t seen before and (2) a corresponding conviction that improvements were being made in art, science, philosophy, and in life in general. Beyond those amorphous, but important, characteristics, the Enlightenment could be a free-for-all of competing ideas, values, and virtues

Myth #2: The Enlightenment was anti-religion.

To be sure, some Enlightenment thinkers were virulent in their opposition to traditional religious doctrines and institutions, but Peter Gay’s understanding of the Enlightenment as “The Rise of Modern Paganism” has been often (and successfully) challenged. In a recent article in the Journal of the History of Ideas, Simon Grote makes a strong case for recognizing the contributions theologians made to the Enlightenment and for understanding the ecclesiastical context in which many of the Enlightenment discussions took place.

While I often disagree with the conclusions reached by Enlightenment theologians and philosophers, we should not misread the Enlightenment as everywhere anti-clerical and anti-Christian. The leading lights in the Scottish Enlightenment, for example, were middle-class and upper-middle-class professional men. They were not bohemians, pantheists, free thinkers, revolutionaries, or otherwise alienated intellectuals. The Moderate literati were elite members of society, serving key roles in law, education, and the church. And whether we label them Enlightenment thinkers or not, there is no doubt stalwart evangelicals like John Witherspoon, John Erskine, and Jonathan Edwards were not afraid to enter the most contested philosophical controversies of the 18th century and employ Enlightenment categories when necessary.

Myth #3: The Enlightenment was about the exaltation of human reason.

Superficial accounts make it sound as if the Enlightenment uniformly prized cold, hard reason over imagination, affection, intuition, and revelation. While it’s true that most Enlightenment thinkers championed the value of empirical observation—whether in nature, morals, or metaphysics—this is not the same as championing reason over all other sources of knowledge. Sentimentalists like Lord Shaftesbury and Francis Hutcheson believed in a moral sense prior to reason. Skeptics like David Hume questioned whether our knowledge can be rationally justified and whether we can truly know things in the first place. And Common Sense philosophers like Thomas Reid and James Beattie argued for certain givens in intellectual investigation that are not the product of reason so much as they are the foundation for the reasoning we all do instinctively.

You could add to this diversity, disagreements about whether man is a tabula rasa, whether he is motivated by benevolence or by self-interest, and whether free will (of various definitions) is an illusion. All that to say, pick ten famous Enlightenment thinkers and you’ll find almost as many views on human nature, how we know what we know, why we do what we do, and the complementary (or divergent) roles of reason and revelation.

In short, we would do well to pay more attention to original sources than to simplistic schematics. As is true with all isms, epochs, and capital-letter Movements, it’s best to understand a few of the trees before we look to the forest to explain anything, let alone everything.

Five Reasons to Obey the Ten Commandments

The Ten Commandments are not to be ignored. It’s important that we study and understand them. But, of course, it’s more important that we obey them. God isn’t impressed by an intellectually careful analysis that puts the Decalogue at the center of Christian discipleship. He expects disciples to actually follow these commands.

But for the right reasons. Working hard to obey the Ten Commandments from the wrong motivation and for the wrong end is a surefire way to live out our relationship with God in the wrong way. God gave the commandments that they might be obeyed—not to earn salvation but because of who we are, who God is in himself, who he is to us, where we are, and what he has done.

Reason 1: Who We Are

Don’t miss the obvious: Exodus 19 comes before Exodus 20. God has already identified the Israelites as “a kingdom of priests and a holy nation” (Ex. 19:6). They are a people set apart. The same is true of us. As Christians, we too are a kingdom of priests and a holy nation (1 Pet. 2:9). We must be prepared to stand alone, to look different, and to have rules the world doesn’t understand. Of course, we aren’t always the holy people we should be, but that’s what he has called us to be. That’s who we are. We are God’s people, set apart to live according to God’s ways.

Reason 2: Who God Is in Himself

The opening verses in Exodus 20 are not just filler before the commandments start rolling. They establish who God is and why we should obey him. In verse 2 God reveals himself again as “the Lord,” that is, as Yahweh their covenant keeping God. This is the God who spoke to Moses in the burning bush. This is the God who said, “I am who I am” (Ex. 3:14). This is the sovereign, self-existent, self-sufficient, almighty creator God. This is the God of the plagues and the Red Sea and the manna in the wilderness. This is not a God to be trifled with. If there is a God, and if he is anything like the God who is revealed to us in the Scriptures, then it would be extremely presumptuous, foolish, and (by all accounts) dangerous for us to crowdsource our own ethical code.

The law is an expression of the Lawgiver’s heart and character. We must think about that before we say, “I don’t care for laws,” or before we bristle at the thought of do’s and don’ts. The commandments not only show us what God wants; they show us what God is like. They say something about his honor, his worth, and his majesty. They tell us what matters to God. We can’t disdain the law without disrespecting the Lawgiver.

Reason 3: Who God Is to Us

The God of the Ten Commandments is revealed not just as the Lord, but as the “Lord your God” (Ex. 20:2). We are his treasured possession (Ex. 19:5; 1 Pet. 2:9). This God of absolute power is not a capricious tyrant, not some cranky deity who wields raw and unbridled authority without any regard for his creatures. He is a personal God, and in Christ he always is for us (Rom. 8:31). It would be frightening to the point of death if God thundered from the heavens, “I am the Lord!” But the divine self-disclosure doesn’t stop there. He goes on to add, “. . . your God.” He is on our side. He is our Father. He gives us commands for our good.

Reason 4: Where We Are

The biblical definition of freedom is not “doing whatever you want.” Freedom is enjoying the benefits of doing what we should. We too often think of the Ten Commandments as constraining us—as if God’s ways will keep us in servitude and from realizing our dreams and reaching our potential. We forget that God means to give us abundant life (John 10:10) and true freedom (John 8:32). His laws, 1 John 5:3 tells us, are not burdensome.

You think it’s burdensome to have Ten Commandments? Do you know how many laws there are in the United States? It’s a trick question, because no one knows! There are twenty thousand laws on the books regulating gun ownership alone. In 2010 an estimated forty thousand new laws were added at various levels throughout the country. The United States Code, which is just one accounting of federal laws and does not include regulatory statutes, has more than fifty volumes. In 2008 a House committee asked the Congressional Research Service to calculate the number of criminal offenses in federal law. They responded, five years later, that they lacked the manpower and resources to answer such a question.

God is not trying to crush us with red tape and regulations. The Ten Commandments are not prison bars, but traffic laws. Maybe there are some anarchists out there who think, “The world would be a better place without any traffic laws.” A few of us drive as if that were so! But even if you get impatient when you’re at a red light, try to zoom through the yellow, and turn left on a very stale pink—overall, aren’t you glad that there is some semblance of law and order? People stop and go. People slow down when driving by schools. They stop for school buses. You wouldn’t be able to drive your car to the grocery store without laws. When you drive on a switchback on a mountain pass, do you curse the guard rails that keep you from plunging to an untimely death? No, someone put them there at great expense, and for our good, that we may travel about freely and safely.

The Ten Commandments are not instructions on how to get out of Egypt. They are rules for a free people to stay free.

Reason 5: What He Has Done

Note once again that the law comes after gospel—after the good news of deliverance. God did not come to the people as slaves and say, “I have Ten Commandments. I want you to get these right. I’m going to come back in five years, and if you’ve gotten your life cleaned up, I’ll set you free from Egypt.” That’s how some people view Christianity: God has rules, and if I follow the rules, God will love me and save me. That’s not what happened in the story of the exodus. The Israelites were an oppressed people, and God said, “I hear your cry. I will save you because I love you. And when you are saved, free, and forgiven, I’m going to give you a new way to live.”

We need to hear it again: salvation is not the reward for obedience; salvation is the reason for obedience. Jesus does not say, “If you obey my commandments, I will love you.” Instead, he first washes the feet of the disciples and then says, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments” (John 14:15). All of our doing is only because of what he has first done for us.

This post is taken from my new book, The 10 Commandments: What They Mean, Why They Matter, and Why We Should Obey Them, published by Crossway and released later this month.

The Church at Election Time

I have always been interested in politics. I studied religion and political science in college. I continue to read consistently in economics, sociology, politics, and current events. As a pastor, I hope the members of my church are well-informed and engaged in the political process. As Christians, we should take seriously our responsibility to be salt and light in a world that is often rotten and dark.

And yet, I believe pastors must be very careful how they lead their churches in our politically polarized culture. I know there are good brothers and sisters who may disagree with these principles and their practical implications. But at the very least, pastors must disciple their leaders and their congregations in thinking through these matters wisely and theologically.

Let me mention two things I do as a pastor and three things I do not do.

As a pastor, I pray publicly for leaders and for controversial issues. We are commanded to pray for the governing authorities, whether we agree with them, like them, or trust them (1 Tim. 2:1-2). Likewise, I think it’s appropriate to include some current events in the weekly pastoral prayer. Over the past few years, I’ve included items related to Ferguson, Charlottesville, the police shootings in Dallas, the presidential election, gay marriage, Roe v. Wade, the anniversary of MLK’s assassination, and dozens of events that could be construed as “political.” I trust, however, that the prayers were not political in the worst sense of that word. I take pains to be sure that everything I pray for has Scriptural warrant. During an election season, pastors should pray that God would work through the political process to give us godly leaders who are marked by ability, prudence, honesty, courage, humility, and compassion.

As a pastor, I speak to controversial issues as they arise from the text of Scripture. In preaching on Exodus 21, I talked about the history of slavery and the evils of it in our country. Later in the chapter I talked about the evil of abortion. In chapter 22, I talked about the biblical definition of justice. I also talked about the biblical understanding of the sojourner and how Christians are to love the stranger and the alien (and how this does not automatically translate into a given immigration policy). All of these touched on political topics. I didn’t mention a candidate, a political party, or advocate for any specific policy or legislation. I simply spoke to issues that were manifestly in the text. We cannot teach the whole counsel of God without venturing once in awhile into difficult territory that may be unpopular in our cultural context.

As a pastor, I do not provide voter guides for the congregation. I know there are other pastors who advocate the practice, but in my experience even non-partisan voter guides are never completely non-partisan. In 2016 I saw a non-partisan voter guide from the Family Research Council and another one from Sojourners. Both guides were designed to inform Christians about the important issues facing us in the election and how to think about those issues from a Christian perspective. Not surprisingly, the two guides talked about very different issues and presented the Christian view in very different ways. Only a die-hard Republican could think the FRC guide was non-partisan. Only a die-hard Democrat could think the Sojourners guide was non-partisan.

Granted, there are other guides that are less didactic and more informational. Many non-partisan guides ask the candidates a series of questions and then record where they stand on the key issues. But even here, the guides I’ve seen over the years all have a definite angle. If you have only twelve questions to ask the candidates, what you ask says a lot about what issues you think are important, and the wording of each question usually reflects certain priorities. In short, I don’t believe non-partisan voter guides are actually non-partisan.

There’s also the practical issue of how visitors and “outsiders” tend to view these guides. For millennials and minorities, “values” voter guides usually signal “this is a church for Republicans.” We can say that’s not the intent, and I believe most Christians passionate about these guides are motivated by a sincere desire to inform people about the issues, but the fact is most white evangelical churches are already overwhelmingly Republican. Let’s not give visitors any more reasons to think this is a church mainly for GOP conservatives (or vice-versa if you are known as a progressive church).

Does this mean some candidates and some positions aren’t better than others? Of course not. Elections matter. Does all this mean I don’t care about abortion or marriage or religious freedom (or immigration reform or criminal justice reform)? No. I’ve written about all those things. I pray about them from the pulpit as appropriate, and I talk about them from the pulpit as they come up in the Bible. I want my people to be informed about politics, just like I hope they are informed about many other things. But I don’t believe it’s the calling of the church as the church to provide candidate profiles, especially when the normal channels for providing this information are never entirely objective.

As a pastor, I do not encourage voter registration drives in the lobby after church. I believe voting is a good thing. When I moved from Michigan to Iowa for my first church, I made sure to vote in the August primary early in the morning before driving 12 hours to my new home. I believe Christians would do well to get informed and vote. And yet, I am hard pressed to find scriptural warrant for thinking Christians must vote as a matter of obedience to Christ. By conducting voter registration in the church we are communicating, “This is what Christians should do.” Voting is generally a good thing, but I have no biblical authority to say a Christian must vote (would we exercise church discipline on someone who didn’t?), nor do I think that voting is such a necessary expression of the fruit of the Spirit that it is the church’s responsibility to get people registered.

The Puritans were wise in establishing the Regulative Principle for worship: the church has no authority to bind the conscience or issue commands except by explicit Scriptural warrant, or when deduced by good and necessary consequence. Much of the political polarization in the church could be greatly helped if the Regulative Principle were applied to cultural matters as well as to worship. The point of the Regulative Principle is not to get everyone buttoned up theologically (though that can be good too). The point is to protect Christian freedom and preserve Christian unity, both of which are ultimately about maintaining a faithful gospel witness in our world.

One final related thought: as much as I hope biblically-minded Christians vote, we must be careful that we don’t equate “salt and light” with political victories. Political engagement is only one way of loving our neighbor and trying to be a faithful presence in the culture. Likewise, we must not assume that all good causes must make their way into the church budget, into the church bulletin, or into the church lobby. There are thousands of ways individual Christians will live our their vocations, use their gifts, and exercise their passions–and the vast majority of these ways will not involve announcements from the pulpit or church-sponsored activities.

As a pastor, I do not give a public platform to candidates in our church (or candidates visiting our church), especially during an election season. Even with the best of intentions, introducing a candidate injects a note of politics into the service. Of course, we welcome all political candidates to worship with us or simply to check out our church, but to ask for (or to invite) an introduction or recognition in the worship service misappropriates the purpose of the Lord’s Day gathering. I don’t want there to be any confusion about whether the church is endorsing a candidate by noting his presence. Nor do I want to give the candidate the opportunity to be seen and recognized in public worship. He (or she) should be in worship to worship, not to be seen as someone who worships. And if the goal is simply to meet constituents, that purpose can better be served in another venue at another time.

I understand these three “do nots” are common practices in churches of many different traditions. Republican-voting, Trump-supporting churches do these things. Democrat-voting, Trump-loathing churches do these things. But however common these things may be, I do not believe they are wise. They presume for the church an authority that she does not have, and they present an obstacle to fellowship that need not be present.

The reality is, these practices are common in many churches, because many churches are politically uniform. The voter guides go out because almost everyone already agrees with them. The candidate gets recognized because almost everyone already votes for that party. Voter registration happens because we assume people in our church are going to vote for the people we vote for. My fear is that, put together, these measures are more effective at limiting the number of people who feel comfortable at our church than they are at increasing the number of people who vote “the right way.”

To be sure, Christians may seek to educate and mobilize their fellow American citizens, but the unique aim, purpose, and warrant of the church is to educate and mobilize our fellow citizens of heaven. We must not confuse one mission with the other.

For more on this topic, see my previous blog posts on the nature of church power, social justice, and the preacher and politics.

Theological Primer: The Nature of Church Power

From time to time I make new entries into this continuing series called “Theological Primer.” The idea is to present big theological concepts in around 500 words. Today we will look at the nature of church power.

God has ordained two great agencies of divine authority on the earth: the state and the church. They are both governed by God and accountable to God, but the way in which God exercises his power through the state and the church differs significantly. In keeping with the distinction laid out in Matthew 22:16-21 (“render to Caesar the things which are Caesar’s”), James Bannerman argues that the state has been given authority to exercise power relative to the outward and temporal rights and privileges of men. The church, by contrast, has been given authority to exercise power relative to the inward and spiritual state and consciences of men (The Church of Christ, 233-45).

The nature of church power is ministerial and declarative. This means all church power–whether exercised by the whole body, pronounced from the pulpit, or bound up in representative officers–must be in service to Christ (ministerial) and involves stating and enforcing the Word of God (declarative). In Presbyterian polity, a group of elders exercising church power (in a session, a presbytery, or general assembly), is called a “court” of the church because the power vested in church officers is never legislative. As Guy Waters reminds us, the elders are only “called to declare the mind of Christ in relation to the matters that are properly before them” (How Jesus Runs the Church, 66). Church power is a spiritual power, pertaining to believers, exercised in a moral and spiritual way, and never resorting to force (Berkhof, Systematic Theology, 594).

Reformed theologians have typically described church power using three categories.

(1) Potestas dogmatike is the authority the church possesses in regard to doctrine and faith. The power is not absolute, but consists in the church’s calling to interpret the Scriptures, draw up subordinate standards (i.e., confessions), and press the claims of Christ upon the consciences of men. The church has been given power to bear witness to the truth of God to those inside and outside the church.

(2) Potestas diataktike is the authority the church possess in regard to ordinances of government. While the church cannot bind the conscience to any man-made law, it does have power to adopt rules for effective operation that are in accord with the teaching of Scripture. Like every society, the church is well served by doing things “decently and in order” (1 Cor. 14:40; cf. v. 26).

(3) Potestas diakritike is the authority the church posses in regard to the discipline of its members. The church is not given a sword (as the state is), but rather keys that it might open and close membership in the church (as an expression of entrance or expulsion from Christ’s heavenly kingdom).

The function of the church, therefore, as distinct from the state, is “to proclaim, to administer, and to enforce the law of Christ revealed in the Scriptures” (PCA Book of Church Order 3-3). The church qua church has not been granted authority to address every topic, settle every controversy, or right every wrong. The nature of church power extends to all those under its care, but is limited to doctrine, order, and discipline (BCO 11-2).

Is Social Justice a Gospel Issue?

There is a simple, straightforward answer to the question posed in the title of this post: it depends.

Is social justice a gospel issue? That depends on what we mean by “social justice” and what we mean by “gospel issue.”

What Is Social Justice?

I’ve written before that social justice a nebulous term, unassailable to some and arousing suspicion in others. For some Christians, if you aren’t into social justice, then you must not care about racism or abortion or sexual assault or inequality or the imago dei itself. Conversely, if you put in a good word for social justice around other Christians, they may assume you hug trees and hate police officers. The term has no shared meaning, or at least no precise definition we all agree on.

As far as we know, the term “social justice” dates to the 1840s when it was first used by a Jesuit philosopher named Luigi Taparelli (1793-1862). Taparelli was a strong supporter of Papal authority and a conservative Catholic who argued that social inequality was not a violation of justice but a byproduct of justice, which he understood to be the right ordering of constitutional arrangements. Taparelli’s use of “social justice” bears little resemblance to how the term is used in common conversation today.

Before we can evaluate the connection between social justice and the gospel, we have to know what we mean by the former. If “social justice” entails specific policy proposals, certain candidates Christians should (or shouldn’t) support, and definite conclusions about economic and racial disparities, mass incarceration, immigration reform, and a host of other debatable topics, then we ought to be extremely cautious about linking something as politically prescriptive as social justice with something as universally salvific as the gospel.

Of course, Christians can (and should) have biblically informed convictions about policy proposals, candidates, and any number of controversial subjects.  I would never wish to shut out Christian citizens and Christian thinking from the thorniest problems of our day. Some arguments are better than others. But we must distinguish between good and bad arguments and Christian and non-Christians positions. On the right, I sometimes hear that if you care about abortion (which, according to the Bible, is a sin) you must support Trump, while from the left, I hear that if you care about racism (which, according to the Bible, is also a sin) you must never support Trump. While I certainly have my opinions about our President, the church must not go beyond its God-given authority and power in binding the consciences of her members to positions or conclusions that honest Christians can disagree on.

I have my concerns with the term social justice and with all that it connotes. But what if we press for a less culturally controlled and more biblically defined understanding? Several years ago, I worked my way through the major justice passages in the Bible: Leviticus 19, Leviticus 25, Isaiah 1, Isaiah 58, Jeremiah 22, Amos 5, Micah 6:8, Matthew 25:31-46, and Luke 4.  My less than exciting conclusion was that we should not oversell or undersell what the Bible says about justice. On the one hand, there is a lot in the Bible about God’s care for the poor, the oppressed, and the vulnerable. There are also plenty of warnings against treating the helpless with cruelty and disrespect. On the other hand, justice, as a biblical category, is not synonymous with anything and everything we feel would be good for the world. Doing justice means following the rule of law, showing impartiality, paying what you promised, not stealing, not swindling, not taking bribes, and not taking advantage of the weak because they are too uninformed or unconnected to stop you.

So for simplicity sake, let’s take biblical “social justice” to mean something like “treating people equitably, working for systems and structures that are fair, and looking out for the weak and the vulnerable.” If that’s what we mean, is social justice a gospel issue?

What Is a Gospel Issue?

Again, we have to define our terms. If “gospel issue” means we are smuggling good works into the sola fide side of the equation, then clearly social justice is not a gospel issue. We don’t save the least of the these in order to save ourselves.

Likewise, if “gospel issue” means “as important as the proclamation of Christ crucified” then the answer must again be no. There is only one thing that can be of first importance, and that, according to Paul in 1 Corinthians 15, is the message that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures and was raised on the third day.

I’ll go even further: “gospel issue” should not be shorthand for “you must be passionate about all the same things I’m passionate about.” Nor should it be synonymous with notions of “building the kingdom” or “transforming the culture.” By the same token, preachers must be careful lest they allow CNN and Fox News, not to mention Twitter and Facebook, to set the agenda for their weekly pulpit ministry. If pastors in our day let cultural concerns crowd out the preaching of new birth, repentance, and justification by faith alone, it wouldn’t be the first time in the church’s history that the “gospel” became more social than gospel.

And yet, “gospel issue” need not mean any of these things. If “gospel issue” means “a necessary concern of those who have been saved by the gospel” or “one aspect of what it means to keep in step with the gospel” or “realities without which you may not be truly believing the gospel,” then social justice is certainly a gospel issue. When biblically defined, social justice is part and parcel of loving our neighbor as ourselves. It’s part of keeping the second table of the Decalogue. It’s part of doing the good works God has prepared in advance for us to walk in (Eph. 6:10).

Conclusion

As in so many controversies, we must be quicker to define our terms than to define our opponents. No doubt, there are real disagreements worth exploring and exposing. But there also may be more agreement than some might initially imagine. Depending on our definitions, social justice and the gospel may be miles apart, or they may be as close as loving God by obeying his commands (John 14:15).

Why Pastors Should Consider Preaching (At Least) 5 Minutes Shorter

Let me get my caveats out of the way first.

Yes, I have preached my share of long sermons (more on that in a moment). I don’t do many 15-minute homilies. My last four sermons on the Christ Covenant website (as of Monday) were 43 minutes, 46 minutes, 46 minutes, and 36 minutes. I aim for 40 minutes, but I bet my average is closer to 45 minutes (as the small sample size suggests). So my own congregation may read this post and say, “Physician, heal thyself!”

Moreover, I realize that in some contexts, cutting five minutes would bring the sermon from 25 minutes to 20 minutes, or from 18 minutes to 13 minutes. That feels far too light a meal to feed God’s people a healthy diet of Scriptural truth. As John Stott famously quipped, “Sermonettes make Christianettes.”

I also understand that the “proper” length of a sermon is culturally conditioned. In some churches, it may take years to get them accustomed to 30 minutes, while other churches have plenty of practice with two-hour services and 60-minute messages. I’m not laying down an ironclad law.

Having said all that, I feel comfortable making the assertion that the majority of preachers in our conservative, Reformedish circles could safely cut their sermon length by five or ten minutes (or more) and be more effective because of it.

While guest preaching in a church several years ago I asked the senior pastor how long I should preach. He replied, “Five minutes shorter than you think.” He wasn’t trying to be mean. His advice was tongue-in-cheek. But it was also partly serious. He went on to add that he’d rarely heard a sermon that couldn’t have been better by being five minutes shorter.

That got me thinking: did my sermons really need to be 50 or 55 minutes? When I look back at old sermons I’m almost always amazed by how much I tried to cram into the sermon. That’s always been a weakness of mine. I try to give people the whole elephant. It’s not necessary. The good thing about preaching for many years to the same people is that eventually you’ll get to say the important things that need to be said. There’s no need to make a single sermon touch on anger and membership and the regulative principle and the glory of God and the atonement, even if the passage fairly applies to all those areas.

We honor good preaching in our circles. And we should. Preaching is the lifeblood of the church. There is no greater calling than to herald the riches of Christ. But good preaching is not the same as long preaching. We love to hear of the Puritan preachers who turned over the hourglass and settled in for a second hour of sermonizing. Many of our heroes from ages past preached long, dense, wonderful messages. What we forget is that those congregations often complained about those sermons too! The Dutch Reformed in the colonies tried (usually in vain) to restrict the Domine to only one hour in the pulpit.

More importantly, we overlook the fact that today’s congregations have books and podcasts and small groups and Sunday school classes and book studies and a host of opportunities to be instructed in the Word. The Puritans were preaching to many people who couldn’t read and who received all their Bible teaching from Sunday services (or pastoral catechizing). So a 30-minute sermon is not necessarily a capitulation to short attention spans. We live in a different time with different avenues for good Bible teaching.

Of course, there is no absolute rule to any of this. Like I said, earlier in my ministry I was drifting toward an hour. Now I’m around 45 minutes, aiming for slightly less. I think my preaching is better as a result. This isn’t about cutting corners in the study. Almost every pastor can testify that preaching for 35 minutes is harder than preaching for 50 minutes. Just like in writing, it takes more work to be concise. The sermons I usually feel the worst about are the ones that went too long. And normally they went too long because I didn’t do the necessary work ahead of time to prune, to focus, to cut out unnecessary repetitions, to scuttle dispensable digressions.

The hard reality is that I don’t think I’m good enough for 60-minute sermons every week. The freeing reality, however, is that I don’t have to go 60 minutes to preach an exegetically responsible, theologically rich, personally relevant, doxologically powerful sermon.

Here’s the bottom line: there’s no need to preach for an hour when 40 minutes will do. The truth is most people will be glad for a shorter sermon. The parents with children in the pew certainly will be. Your wife just might be too. And the nursery workers will rise up and call you blessed.

Some PhD FAQs

I promise I will get back to your regularly scheduled programming. This is the last doctoral digression (for the time being anyway). But since I’ve received dozens of questions over the past couple years about pursuing a PhD (including several after last week’s post), I thought it would be helpful to tackle the pertinent issues in one place.

For the most part, the questions below are not the exact questions I’ve received, but they capture the kinds of questions I’ve gotten over the past weeks and months.

Should I pursue a PhD?

That depends. You need to know yourself, know your options, and know your goals.

(1) You need to know yourself. A rigorous PhD is not for everyone. There’s no shame in that. A doctoral degree is not a measure of godliness or effectiveness in ministry. It’s not something to do just because other people are doing it or people you respect have done it. You must be motivated. You must enjoy reading. You must be fairly well disciplined and organized. You must be a proficient writer. If you haven’t been one of the top students in undergraduate or graduate school, I’d think twice before pursuing a PhD. I’m not saying B- students can’t do excellent doctoral work, but I’d get some honest feedback before enrolling in more school.

(2) You need to know your options. Don’t bankrupt your finances, your family, or your soul for a PhD. Count the cost.

(3) You need to know your goals. If you main goal is to procure some kind of status symbol or have people call you Dr., I’d angle for an honorary doctorate somewhere (obviously, I’m not suggesting people with honorary degrees have angled for one). Sure, I’ll be proud to have finished my work, but I find it distasteful when people insist on being called Dr. (often without an academic degree) or when they put PhD after every byline. Enough already.

If your main goal is to be a full-time academic, be realistic about your chances. We need full-time academics. It’s a noble and wonderful calling. The job market, however, is terrible. There are far more doctorates being awarded than there are jobs out there that actually require a doctorate.

If you just want to learn and be stretched, a PhD can be great, but check first if there are cheaper, more flexible (even if less prestigious) ways to be a lifelong learner.

So why did you pursue a PhD?

There were at least six reasons: (1) I’ve had the itch to do so for almost 20 years. (2) People who know me said I’d be able to do it. (3) I wanted to grow intellectually and be challenged at the highest academic level. (4) It would give me a seat at the academic table (should I need it) and allow me to teach at universities or seminaries. (5) I love to read and to write. (6) I found a subject I was really interested in and for which I could make an original contribution to scholarship.

Incidentally, before applying to doctoral programs I was told by one scholar friend that it would be a waste of God’s time and my effort for me to get a PhD just to get one. He counseled me that if I didn’t want to make an original contribution to my field that I shouldn’t apply.

Do you recommend pastors get their PhD like you did?

Probably not. I am a firm believer in seminaries and in the need for educated clergy. But with extremely rare exceptions, a PhD is not necessary for effective pastoral ministry. In fact, in some cases, it can get in the way of effective ministry. It takes time. It takes money. And when you are done, if you aren’t careful, you can be more distant from the people you are called to shepherd.

And yet, I am a pastor, and I went back to school to get my PhD, so clearly I don’t think the answer is always no. I think my program has made me a better thinker and a more careful scholar (I use the term loosely). I’ve enjoyed the whole thing. I never got to the burnout “please make it stop” stage. I’m glad I got—well, almost have—my PhD.

I would also say that I’m glad I waited to get my PhD. There are certainly advantages to getting your PhD right after seminary while your intellectual fires are burning, your family commitments are fewer, and your pastoral responsibilities are small. Finding time to get a PhD in the midst of full-time ministry and a busy family life is challenging. But for me at least, I was better prepared for a PhD after another 16 years of reading and 10 years of constant blogging and writing. I also fear for bright, young seminary graduates that if they go straight into doctoral work, they’ll never make it to pastoral ministry. Maybe that’s okay. But if your goal is the pastorate, a PhD won’t prepare you much for that, and you may enjoy the academic life so much that your dreams of pastoral ministry fade away.

Along the same lines, realize that professors—most of whom have a PhD—may be inclined to encourage doctoral work. After all, they did it, and they enjoyed it. I’m not suggesting you can’t trust your professors (I am one!), but seek counsel from multiple voices.

What kind of program should I look for?

Again, that depends. Not all programs are created equal. I’ve read plenty of dissertations and thought, How in the world did this get awarded a PhD? This is barely an MDiv thesis. Just because someone has a PhD doesn’t mean they’ve done anything like rigorous academic work. At the same time, I finished my program in five part-time years (and would have finished in four years if I didn’t change churches), while I know brilliant people who worked full-time for seven or eight years to get their PhD. I think my program was legit, but there are certainly programs that demand more. Think through whether you want a program that is good, better, or best. Don’t bother with anything less than good (and if you don’t know what is less than good, ask professors you respect—they’ll tell you).

Know the difference between American and British PhDs. Those with a reputable American PhD will tell you: “I had to do coursework. I had to take comprehensive exams. I had to do years of work before I even got to my dissertation!” Those with a reputable British PhD will tell you: “I didn’t have anyone holding my hand. I had to know what I was doing from day one. It was all sink or swim on the dissertation!” The advantage of doing a British PhD—and the reason so many Americans look overseas—is that you don’t have to do coursework in addition to the dissertation. There are plenty of excellent programs on both sides of the pond. There are pros and cons to both approaches.

What school should I choose?

The one with the supervisor you want to work with. Period.

To be sure, some jobs may want to see that your degree is from Yale or Cambridge or Edinburgh, but unless you are trying to get into the highest levels of academia, pick the right supervisor before the right school. Sometimes the elite schools have the best advisors. But not always. In fact, even if your aspirations are for a career in academia, you’ll likely see doors open if you have the right contacts, which means, again, the right supervisor.

The best advice I got when starting to look at doctoral programs was to focus on finding the best supervisor. Most Americans know next to nothing about the University of Leicester (pronounced Lester), but my supervisor is a top-flight historian, an excellent mentor, and easy to work with. That made all the difference. If you are thinking about PhD work, don’t just look at prices and pretty pictures online. Ask your professors whom they would recommend you work with.

Why did you choose to study history?

I never thought seriously about Old Testament or New Testament. My interests were more in theology and history. I chose history because I could more assuredly say what I wanted to say about my subject matter. My sense is that the Brits are less fussy about liberal shibboleths than their American counterparts anyway, but even so, I figured history was the best way to spend the bulk of my time reading things I wanted to read.

How did you pay for it?

There are many ways to pay for your program. Many of the most sought-after programs will award a limited number of scholarships that essentially pay you to do doctoral work. Some people seek help from churches, family, and friends. Others try crowdsourcing. I paid for my program out of my own pocket.

Was it hard?

In some ways, no. But mostly, yes.

The PhD was not hard like a math problem can be hard. There was never a moment when I couldn’t understand what I was reading or when I didn’t have a clue what I was doing. You don’t need to be a genius to write a good dissertation in the humanities.

At the same time, I did work hard. My biggest advantage was that after years of blogging, publishing, and sermonizing, I already knew how to write. Poor writing is what sinks a lot of bright doctoral students. The other struggle for many students is discipline. Procrastination will kill you. So will an unwillingness to receive correction. It’s also important that you keep momentum going. You need a lot of internal motivation and a willingness to figure things out on your own. And the figuring out—at least in the British system—is not just your subject matter. No one tells you what your next three assignments are. You have to ask questions, read the handbook, and seek out help. From the first meeting as a PhD student, I was expected to set the agenda and come prepared to share what I knew and ask questions.

How did you do it with everything else going on?

I do sleep, usually around seven hours. I exercise and spend time with my family too. I’ve been a full-time pastor all during my doctoral work. It can be done.

But I needed a flexible program. I had to take a few seminars (e.g., handling rare books, reading old handwriting), but there was no official coursework. My program required me to travel to the UK once a year. In addition, I had to Skype with my supervisor at least once every other month. There were also periodic reviews with papers to submit (showing my progress) and probationary interviews to complete. The dissertation was the main thing, and the rest was flexible.

More importantly, I would not have been able to do a PhD without the generous support of University Reformed Church and Christ Covenant Church. This may not be feasible in smaller churches. In my context there were other capable pastors eager for preaching opportunities and ready to lead in my absence. All told, the two churches gave me more than three summers off for research and writing. In my experience, a PhD is not something you can do 30 minutes here or there, or by setting aside an hour every evening. You need concentrated time. You need momentum. Once I got going, I could get a lot accomplished in a short period of time. But once that time was up, the engine started to idle. I found that I could keep reading while I was a full-time pastor, but I need months away to write.

Faithful Conference 2018

In a world that often prizes style over substance and quick fixes over quiet obedience, Jesus calls us to something better, something more important, and something more lasting. He calls us to be faithful. The first annual Faithful Conference is a multi-church event that aims to equip and inspire Christians for doctrinal fidelity, personal integrity, and corporate witness in the Charlotte area and beyond. The conference will be held at Christ Covenant Church in Matthews, NC on September 21-22, 2018.

Our keynote speaker, Dr. Albert Mohler, is the President of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. I will do one plenary session. We will also be joined by three area pastors who will lead our breakout sessions: David Russell (Oakhurst Baptist Church), Tom Hawkes (Uptown Church), and Bill Barcley (Sovereign Grace Presbyterian Church). This year’s theme is “Our Unchanging Christ: Yesterday, Today, and Forever.” For more information and to register, please go to faithfulconference.org.

Here is the schedule:

Friday, September 21

Doors open at 6:00pm

7:00-8:30 PM Session 1: Christ as Prophet (Mohler)

8:45-9:30 PM Session 2: Kevin DeYoung interviews Al Mohler

Saturday, September 22

9:00-10:00 AM Session 3: Christ as Priest (Mohler)

10:15-11:00 AM Session 4 (DeYoung)

11:15 AM-Noon Breakout Sessions

12:00-1:30 PM Lunch on your own

1:30-3:00 PM Session 5: Christ as King (Mohler)

Dr. Mohler will also be preaching the morning service (10:45 AM) at Christ Covenant Church on September 23.

Registration for the conference is only $25. The family maximum is $50. Full time college and seminary students can register for $10. The worship service on Sunday is, of course, free.

The Faithful Conference is sponsored by five Charlotte area churches: Christ Covenant Church, Uptown Church, Sovereign Grace Presbyterian Church, Hickory Grove Baptist, and Oakhurst Baptist Church.