Barnabas Piper's Blog, page 68

New Happy Rant: New Year’s Revelations, Book Reading, and Reformed Resolutions

In this episode of The Happy Rant – the first of 2018 – Ted, Ronnie, and Barnabas start the year strong by ranting about the following.

New Year’s Revelations – Instead of resolving to to do something the hosts reveal something they need to get off their chest or admit.
Which books we did not read or finish in 2017
One resolution we wish reformdom would make and keep in 2018

Be sure to visit our website to get fresh roasted coffee from Lagares Roasters, order your Happy Rant swag from Missional Wear, and order your tickets for our next LIVE event – Together for the Rant – to be held in April.

Please consider supporting the podcast financially as well. We have set up a Patreon page, and your donations help us cover production costs, do live events, and grow the podcast by trying some new things. Oh, and of course there are perks for those who commit to helps us such as free books and coffee!

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Episode #176

He Reads Truth: The Golden Calf

I have the privilege of contributing to He Reads Truth, a website of whose purpose is “To help men become who we were made to be, by doing what we were made to do, by the power and provision that God has given us to do it, for the glory of Jesus Christ.” They do this by providing scripture reading plans accompanied by reflections that can be accessed for free online or purchased as print books. For those of you looking to engage scripture in a fresh way – either because you are dried up or have been away from it, these studies/plans will refresh your soul and engage your mind.

What follows is one of the pieces I wrote for the Life of Moses plan. You can find the full plan HERE.

Exodus 32:1-35, Malachi 4:1-6

I am not a patient person. When a big decision looms, I gravitate toward the quickest decision which is (surprise, surprise) not always the best one. Impatience gets me in trouble. When I grasp at the solution at hand instead of seeking the best solution, it almost never goes well.

That’s what Israel did in Exodus 32. They tired of waiting on Moses and on God. They knew what was right, but it required patience and faith, so they discarded it. Instead of waiting for Moses to return from Sinai with God’s word, they demanded a new god made of gold.

This sounds absurd, doesn’t it? You can’t just manufacture a god. If it’s manufactured then it isn’t a deity. It’s just a decoration.

At the same time, though, we all do this when we choose to grasp at hope in something that isn’t God. Maybe it is money or employment or a relationship or status. Each of these are manufactured things, made up of created matter and created beings. They aren’t gods, yet we still turn to worship them and place our hopes in them—just like Israel did with the golden calf that Aaron made.

We forget something when we do this, something of utmost importance. We forget God —just like Israel forgot the God that thundered atop Sinai and wrote His commands on stone tablets. We forget God who freed us from our bondage to sin just like they forgot God who freed them from bondage to Egypt. Forgetting God has dire consequences.

For Israel, it led to the deaths of more than 3,000 people, followed by a plague that struck down even more. Is that vindictive of God, or too harsh? No. It’s a reminder of His holiness and how seriously this holy God takes idolatry. He is the only God to be worshipped.

God was setting aside a people for Himself, a people through whom He would bless the whole world. How could they be set apart as His if they gave themselves to a golden bovine? How can anyone who claims to be part of God’s people now be set apart if we worship anything other than Him?

God is holy—wholly other and perfect. There is no other. And that means we must be in or out, redeemed and committed to Him or facing judgment for our rebellion. We cannot pick our god. There is no menu off of which we order deities. Will we worship The Lord even when it means waiting and wondering? Because in this life, there will be waiting and wondering.

 

How Curiosity Makes Us More Creative and Better Image Bearers

One of the most profound ways humans live our vocation of reflecting God as unique image bearers is through creating. Unlike any other beast of the field or bird of the air, people can make. We cannot create ex-nihilo like God (thus the fact that we are reflecting or echoing), but we can take all that God has created and transform it into useful and beautiful things.

Somewhere along the line someone combined pigmented plants into paint and began to make images on cave walls. Over time people noticed that some wall-decorators made buffaloes and warriors that looked more life-like and vibrant, so they took on the job of painting stories and likenesses. Now the Mona Lisa hangs on the wall of the Louvre and my kids splatter pre-packaged watercolor paints all over our table.

Curiosity about life in all of its aspects, I think, is still the secret of great creative people.

– Leo Burnett

One day, thousands of years ago, a woman worked at grinding some grain or skinning a rabbit to cook for dinner, and as she worked she hummed. What did she hum? Just some notes that came to mind subconsciously. No, that one sounded wrong, kind of ugly. Yes, there it is, the right note, the beautiful one. And a song was composed and dissonance was discovered. And now Nashville exists with a musician or five playing in every restaurant and honky tonk and music labels scattered across the city.

A man once heaved his pick into the hard, dry earth again and again under the burning sun. How would he till enough soil and transport enough water to his little garden patch for his crops to grow and feed his family? He thought about a nearby stream and wondered, “Yes . . .I could dig a trench from there to his little patch.” The ground would be softened and the seeds watered so they could grow. And now as we drive across Indiana, Iowa, or Kansas we see combines the size of small houses harvesting crops by the acre irrigated with miles of pipes. Enough to feed millions of people.

Once doctors bled patients. They put leeches on them to suck out the poison. They sprinkled them with the blood of animals to ward off the evil. They used rusty implements with unwashed hands to do surgery while patients bit rags or sticks until they passed out from the pain to keep from grinding their teach of chomping their tongues. A forty five year old was a village elder, and a seventy year old was mystically or magically old. But this week I took my daughter to a sparkling clean pediatrician’s office replete with fish tank in the waiting room and Sponge Bob Square Pants on TV. After thirty minutes, a throat swab, and signature we were on our way to the pharmacy where an antibiotic prescription awaited us. And now, three days later, a disease that might have killed her two hundred years ago is gone from her body.

We can engineer buildings and cities and transportation systems that connect entire countries and continents. I have a device on the table next to me right now that allows me to send a message to multiple social media networks, FaceTime with my kids, call my wife, make a to-do list that will remind me when to do it, and a billion other things, both useful and mundane. I write this sentence on the backlit keyboard of a Macbook Pro that is more powerful and with more memory than the devices they used to put men on the moon. And that was a pretty amazing technological and scientific feat all it’s own.

I sit here in this coffee shop drinking an Americano made on a sleek stainless steel machine with espresso beans shipped in from Brazil while listening to Oscar Peterson, who died nearly ten years ago, massage my ears with his jazz piano skills. How? How does this compilation of experiences and sensations happen? Man’s creativity and ingenuity as they reflect the image of God by doing and making amazing things.

Creativity is art. It is inventiveness and ingenuity. It is the pursuit of beauty and efficiency. It is the connecting of ideas and resources to make new ideas and better resources. You and I were created to create and discover, created for the vocation of reflecting God’s image. But we were not created to live in isolation. God made man, and it was, the Bible tells us, not good for him to be alone. He was to be in relationship, to live communally. Our vocation is a collective one, a joining together of individuals into cultures to reflect God.

And as people come together to do this, to find ways for lives to intersect and work together, cultures and subcultures are created. This means that cultures reflect the image of God. In the West we think individualistically – “I am made in God’s image.” In many parts of the world, though, people view identity as collective – “We are made in God’s image.” Both are correct so long as they do not discount the other. In many cases, the movement of a culture, a group of people, can actually reflect more of God. Like a mosaic is many bright tiles combines to create a picture so a culture is many little reflections combined to present a greater image.

So, Curiosity?

Where does curiosity fit in all this about creation, vocation, creativity, and God’s image? It is the key to sorting it all out, to making a way forward, to actually fulfilling the vocational calling we have to reflect God’s image.

We are not only created to reflect and echo God, we are tasked with doing so in all of life. We were created in a manner unlike any other being, able to create. A huge portion of creativity is discovery.

Jonas Salk didn’t create the polio vaccine from nothing; he discovered it. Albert Einstein didn’t create the theory of relativity from nothing; he discovered it through research and trial and error. Beethoven wrote symphonies, created them, but even that was based on compilations of little discoveries along the way. The same is true for Steve Jobs’ inventions, and Winston Churchill’s leadership. Creativity is discovery put to good use in a fresh way. We cannot discover unless we ask and search; that is curiosity!

Yet, while we are created to reflect God, He never actually discovered anything. He was never curious about anything. He never learned anything. That’s one of the effects of knowing everything, being everywhere, and being eternal. He knows the inner-workings of every bit of matter, the gravitational relationships between cosmic bodies, the thoughts and emotions of humans and animals alike, the history of everything and how all things came to pass, and what will come to pass in the future. And he understands how all of them fit together all of the time across all eras. He created it all and sustains it all. There is nothing for God to discover.

How can we reflect an eternal, infinite God if He has a nature and characteristics we can never emulate? Vocation. We’re back to that word again. A calling, a set of tasks to which we are suited. Our reflection of God is not passive. Our echoing is not inactive. We do not echo like a canyon wall, still and static while noise bounces off of us. We echo like town criers, taking up the message and passing it along clearly and loudly. We reflect on purpose, with intention, by taking action.

And one of those actions is discovery – about God Himself. In order to represent God to the world we must know Him, and to do that we must learn. We must search for truth about His nature, His character, and His work. We must explore both His Word and His world. We absolutely must be curious if we are Christians. Without it we cease to grow and we become incapable of fulfilling our purpose in life.

If we start by growing in this divine curiosity we will then be prepared to begin exploring this weird, complicated messy world that is full of so much amazing truth and beauty and so many awful lies and horror. In brick laying a plumb line is the instrument used to determine whether a wall is perfectly vertical and at the proper ninety degree angle from the ground. Discovery in and of God gives us a plumb line to measure our discoveries of the world. Are they true? Are they right? Do they reflect God? And, more subtly, what pieces of them are good and what pieces need to be discarded or ignored?

Godly curiosity keeps us from becoming simplistic legalists who just label everything as either good or bad. This is discernment, a trait all wise Christians have, and one that relies on curiosity so that it can deeply understand. Most things in our world are not purely good or bad. Curiosity rooted deeply in God’s truth – discernment, that is – helps us see what aspects of culture or creation are beautiful and true and which are not. Being simplistic means we throw a lot of babies out with even more bathwater (an absolutely horrific word picture, if you think about it).

To be a vibrant Christian is to be curious. The more we discover of God the more truth we will know and embody and reflect. The more truth we embody and reflect the more we will recognize it in other parts of creation – other cultures, unfamiliar circumstances, new relationships, unexpected circumstances, novel inventions. Our knee-jerk reaction as humans is to label all unfamiliar things as “bad” or at least to be skeptical. Godly curiosity balances realistic understanding of the world’s sinfulness with a passionate desire to see and find truth, so new things become exciting and full of possibility yet without naivety or ignorance.

Without curiosity we cannot be what God designed us to be. We cannot know Him or His truth as we ought or care for His creation as He wishes. We cannot understand this world or its creator or its faults or its blessings. Curiosity is where that all begins, and curiosity must begin at God Himself – searching, asking, digging, discovering, growing. If we start there His image will reflect and His voice will resonate from us into a world that needs it deeply.

[image error]This post is adapted from an excerpt in my book, The Curious Christian: How Discovering Wonder Enriches Every Part of Life. If you are interested in seeing what kind of curious person you are (or are not) visit CuriousChristianBook.com and take the short assessment.

3 Things I Like This Week – December 28

Each week I share three things I like – It could be a book, a movie, a podcast, an album, a photo, an article, a restaurant, a food item, a beverage, or anything else I simply enjoy and think you might too. You can find a whole pile of things, especially books, I like and recommend HERE.

1. Songs of Jesus by Tim & Kathy Keller

[image error]I don’t love most devotionals. I enjoy being spoon fed thoughts and applications about as much as I would enjoy being spoon fed whipped peas and corn. That is, most devotionals feel like spiritual baby food to me. Not this one. Of course not; it’s the Kellers. For 365 days they walk the reader through the Psalms, some one at a time and other taken in pieces. They offer short, like really short, reflections on each. For someone looking for refreshment and spiritual reminders of the character and promises of God and pointing to Jesus, this is ideal.

2. Pilot Uni-ball Vision Elite Pens

[image error]Fountain pen fans can excuse themselves now. We know your thoughts on pens and we don’t care. Now, for the rest of us pen plebes, I present you the best pen in the world. It writes smoothly, the ink is clear and bold, and each pen lasts a long time. I am a Moleskine guy too, and these work wonderfully with those. Let me close with an invitation. I you find yourself using ballpoint pens why don’t you take a step up in class? Ballpoint pens are the White Castle slider of burgers. These are the 5 Guys burger. They cost a little more, but man, they’re worth it.

3. Lagares Roasters Coffee

[image error]I drink excessive amounts of coffee, and while I am not a coffee snob in the snobbiest of senses I do appreciate excellent roasts. Lagares offers several. I have dripped, French Pressed, and Aeropressed their coffee and any which way you prefer it comes out smooth, balanced, and delicious. We have the chance to partner with them for The Happy Rant podcast, and the Lagares fam is a delight to work with too. As an added perk they don’t price their coffee like they’re Whole Foods either. So it’s delicious, affordable, and provided by excellent people. I think you need some.

Video: Helping Kids Love Jesus In Spite of Church

I gave this message early in 2017 at the Parent’s Summit held at Woodlands Church in Plover, Wisconsin. In it, I try to help parents understand the barriers between their kids and Jesus that occur in and through church – yes, that sounds backward – and how to help their children met Jesus. As a pastor’s kid and life-long church goer I hope I offer a sort of insider’s perspective and first-hand account of overcoming challenges within church.

3 Things I Like This Week – December 21

Each week I share three things I like – It could be a book, a movie, a podcast, an album, a photo, an article, a restaurant, a food item, a beverage, or anything else I simply enjoy and think you might too. You can find a whole pile of things, especially books, I like and recommend HERE.

1. Harry For The Holidays

[image error]I am not the most Christmasy person. In fact I have been called a “Scrooge” by some and a “Gricnh” by others. (The former may be fair at times, but the latter is patently false – I am neither trying to steal Christmas from any cheery folks nor is my heart puny and cold.) However, I do enjoy me some Christmas tunes for a couple weeks leading up to the actual holiday, and Harry For The Holidays is among my favorites. Harry Connick Jr. is what Michael Buble aspires to be but won’t ever achieve. He is a masterful jazz pianist, composer, arranger, and vocalist and he can mix in some blues and gispel for good measure. This album is a delight.

2. Caramel M&Ms

[image error]Chocolate is evidence that God loves and Chocolate with caramel is proof. This year, after a series of pretty terrible efforts (Pretzel M&Ms, really? That’s just disgusting.) Nestle hit a home run with Caramel M&Ms. As far as I’m concerned the world cannot have enough varieties of gooey caramel with delicious milk chocolate, so a version with a thin candy shell gets an A+ from me.

3. Friday Night Lights by H.G. Bissinger

[image error]This is the best sports book I have ever read, and as a former high school football player I resonated with the players in this book. But what made the book great was the depiction of how football was life in west Texas. It was the driving force, the great hope, the lasting memory for so many characters. It fed the town and devoured it. The characters in this book, all real people, are memorable and seminal. They have whole-life stories of pain and power and pursuit. In all, the tapestry Bissinger weaves in this book is unmatched in realness, both wonderful and terrible.

He Reads Truth: The Birth of Christ

I have the privilege of contributing to He Reads Truth, a website of whose purpose is “To help men become who we were made to be, by doing what we were made to do, by the power and provision that God has given us to do it, for the glory of Jesus Christ.” They do this by providing scripture reading plans accompanied by reflections that can be accessed for free online or purchased as print books. For those of you looking to engage scripture in a fresh way – either because you are dried up or have been away from it, these studies/plans will refresh your soul and engage your mind.

What follows is one of the pieces I wrote for the 2016 Advent plan. You can find the full plan HERE.

Luke 2:1-7

Caesar Augustus was the most powerful man in the world. The Roman Empire touched three continents and had subjected numerous nations to its rule, including the little crossroads of a nation, Israel. When Augustus decreed that a census be taken, it was for historical purposes—to record and commemorate his power and reach.

When a dictator says “jump,” his subjects, like it or not, say, “how high?” and they hop to it. For Joseph, a carpenter in the town of Nazareth, that meant packing up his fiancée and making the seventy-mile trip to Bethlehem. Why? Because he had to be registered in the town his family was from, the place of his roots: the city of David, his ancestor and the great king from whom the Messiah would come.

So Joseph made the trip with his very pregnant fiancée, Mary. I’m sure the trip was difficult, what with her condition and the tenuous understanding he likely had about the nature of her pregnancy. He wasn’t the father. She claimed it was miracle of the Holy Spirit, and an angel had told him the same in a dream—all very confusing. After seventy hard miles of walking over three or four days they arrived in Bethlehem, only to find it swarming with people who were there for the same reason they were. The only place they could find to sleep was a stable, alongside the animals.

Apparently a three-day walk is an effective way of inducing labor, because Mary’s time had come. There, in that stable, she gave birth to a son, her mystery baby. She wrapped Him snugly in cloth to keep Him warm against the night’s chill and held Him close like good mothers do. Joseph and Mary laid Him in a feed trough to sleep when the time came. It was the humblest of beginnings and a story to regale the family with at get-togethers for years to come. Almost unbelievable really, this sequence of events.

But isn’t that often the case?

When God moves, the mundane and inconvenient become pivotal in His plan. The decision of an emperor to magnify his own glory leads to the birth of the King of Glory. And not just the birth, but the fulfillment of prophecies dating back centuries.

Caesar decrees a census and the Emperor of emperors is born.

In seven short verses, God reveals the difference between the world’s idea of kingship and His own: Rome vs. Bethlehem, royal robes vs. swaddling cloths, thrones vs. troughs. The wisdom of man is foolishness to God, and God’s wisdom is revealed in the unlikeliest of times, ways, and places—like a small barn, in a small town, in a small country where the Son of God entered the world to save sinners and rule for all time.

New Happy Rant: Christmas Extravaganza

In this episode of The Happy Rant, Ted, Ronnie, and Barnabas muster all the holiday spirit they can manage and bring you a Christmas miracle. Or at least a Christmas episode.

One thing you’d wish for as a gift this year
Feelings on Christmas Eve services?
Best Christmas movie
Best childhood gift

In this episode of The Happy Rant Ted, Ronnie, and Barnabas hit the following topics:

Online dating, finding that perfect someone, and whether “Happy Rant Listener” is the perfect dating profile
Movies we’ve seen lately and our opinions of them
Great acting careers and *not* great acting careers

Be sure to visit our website to get fresh roasted coffee from Lagares Roasters, order your Happy Rant swag from Missional Wear, and order your tickets for our next LIVE event – Together for the Rant – to be held in April.

To listen you can:

Subscribe in iTunes.
Listen on Google Play
Listen on Stitcher.
Leave us a rating in iTunes (it only takes 1 click and it really helps us).
Listen using the player below.

Episode #175

3 Things I Like this Week – December 14

Each week I share three things I like – It could be a book, a movie, a podcast, an album, a photo, an article, a restaurant, a food item, a beverage, or anything else I simply enjoy and think you might too. You can find a whole pile of things, especially books, I like and recommend HERE.

1. Southwest Airlines

[image error]“Now boarding diamond, ruby, emerald, onyx, amethyst, jasper, carnelian, and agate. If you have a granite, sandstone, or shale boarding pass you’ll just have to wait.” This is basically every airline except Southwest. Sure people bemoan their lack of upgrades, but when you get treated like a real human being with dignity and worth who doesn’t have to pay to check bags or wait 2.5 hours to board a flight that was already delayed by 2.5 hours you can deal with no upgrades. Oh, and they ever EVER fly one of those terrible puddle jumper tin cans. For a 6’2″ guy who flies a decent amount for work this matters. Southwest is so good I’ll take a non-direct flight with them to avoid flying all the other airlines even if they have direct flights.

2. Justified

[image error]I love smart shows and funny shows and action shows and crime shows. This is all of the above and with a stellar cast to boot. Timothy Olyphant and Waltin Goggins are kind of the perfect nemeses and the supporting cast is so good. The dialogue is witty without being punchy. The plot lines (especially season 2) are strong. It’s gritty and dark without being grotesque or over the top. It is simply one of the best TV shows I’ve seen.

 

3. Anker Portable Charger

[image error]I travel quite a bit, and a fair number of those trips plant me at conferences or in convention centers where there isn’t easy access to an outlet. This is a problem for those of us who depend on smart phones. I mean, how are we supposed to survive conferences without tweeting snarky things about attendees and speakers? This charger is great because it can charge multiple devices multiple times. When I get to my gate at the airport and the 3 outlets are taken this ensures I can still watch my Netflix and answer my emails (in that order). Any traveler should have a device like this.

 

 

American Leadership vs. Christ-Like Leadership

This excerpt from Scott Sauls’ new book From Weakness to Strength speaks for itself. We need to evaluate leaders according to these standards. We need to be leaders according to these standards. Anything that doesn’t match up is not leadership in any real, substantive sense.

[image error]Jesus offers a radically different understanding of what it means to be a leader. His vision for leadership often parts ways with the typical American view of such things. For example:

In America, credentials qualify a person to lead. In Jesus, the chief qualification is character.

In America, what matters most are the results we produce. In Jesus, what matters most are the kinds of people we are becoming.

In America, success is measured by material accumulation, power, and the positions that we hold. In Jesus, success is measured by material generosity, humility, and the people whom we serve.

In America, it is shameful to come in last and laudable to come in first. In Jesus, the first will be last and the last will be first.

In America, leaders make a name for themselves to become famous and sometimes treat Jesus as a means to that end. In Jesus, leaders make his name famous and treat their own positions, abilities, and influence as a means to that end.

In America, leaders crave recognition and credit. In Jesus, leaders think less of themselves and give credit to others.

In America, leaders compare and compete so they will flourish. In Jesus, leaders sacrifice and serve so others will flourish.

In America, leadership often means “My glory and happiness at your expense.” In Jesus, leadership always means “Your growth and wholeness at my expense.”

In America, the strong and powerful rise to the top. In Jesus, the meek inherit the earth.