(Sunday School) PFT: Week 4

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Alright. Good to see everybody here today. If you would, grab a colored pencil and a bull's eye graphic from the end of your table. We're gonna go ahead and get started. And if you missed one of the prior weeks, I have all the handouts up here. All these classes are also being recorded. So if you grab the handouts, you'll be able to catch up or fill in. All of them right here.

So I wanna give a brief summary up to this point of where we've been and then kind of where we're going because today marks the turn in the class. We've talked about from several different angles where we are right now in a very divided, stressful time to be a Christian in this country and try to figure out how to navigate politics and political conversations. And that's really the focus for this—to engage us, move us toward having conversations.

Review of Prior Weeks

The first week, we talked about the first century. There were all the different groups, and they're either turned toward or turned away from, collaborate with Rome, or oppose Rome. And if you want a reminder of that, that's on sheet number one from up here.

The second week, we talked about how Christians think about our relationship to the state. We went through Jesus' teaching on rendering unto Caesar. We asked, what does that mean? And then we went through the seven church positions. We're not in all of them. We're before, and I tried to map that out where we're actually in the middle three quadrants or middle three parts of that spectrum.

Last week, we talked about some of the relationship between a church and its members, and why churches don't—should not—bind to the conscience of our people by pushing a particular political platform or party. There's, in terms of how Paul lays out things in scripture, we wanna be really careful that we give people concepts, but not baptize a particular application in a lot of places where there is freedom.

The Bull's Eye Framework

So that was last week. And I wanna give one clarifier on last week. That's why you have a bull's eye in the front of your sheet. So if you wanna look at that really quickly, I wanna talk about how we teach what we teach as a church. I had a great question from last Sunday after the class that I just wanna follow up on.

So if you look at this, I've tried to label these below. The innermost ring is the very essentials. This is our PCA vows for people to become a member. And they are: Are you a Christian? Is Jesus your savior? Are you a sinner? Is your only hope in Christ? Very, very simple. This is like black and white—are you in or not? Are you a Christian? And we teach that in our church with a closed fist. This is essential teaching. We bleed for this, we die for this.

The second round, the first ring, the next layer out, is the things that all Orthodox Christians agree with. So this is things like the virgin birth of Jesus. This book is from God, and this is what we base our understanding of who God is off of—this book, the Bible. God is a creator. God is gonna bring things back at the end of time. This is basically what's summarized in the Apostle's Creed. And again, I teach this with a closed fist. We hold on for dear life to these teachings. This is essential Christian doctrine.

Next layer are what we call denominational distinctives. You know that these things—so things like speaking in tongues, things like views of the end times, modes of baptism—those things that Christians have intramural debates over. And this makes up, if you're really honest, about 3 to 5 percent of church doctrine. Now in America, because we have lots and lots of churches, it feels like that's a really big thing. This is actually a very small percentage of what—and the rings here distort some of this because the inner two rings are huge. Those are things all Christians everywhere agree on, and we teach those like this.

Denominational distinctives, I teach like this because I believe these things. Our church believes these things. We're not like, oh, we're debating them regularly in our church, but we are saying like, hey, we believe these things are clear in scripture, but not every Christian agrees with them. They're matters of teaching particular to a church or denomination.

The last group here is what I talked about last week. The last circle are things that are not revealed, and a great verse for this is Deuteronomy.

The revealed things belong to us and our children. They are from the Lord forever. — Deuteronomy 29:29

The unrevealed things are for you. So we have to work out with Christian freedom things like where we send our kids to school. Are we Christian school people? Are we homeschool people? Are we public school people? Those are things that are not mandated or clarified in Scripture in a way. We don't hold this up as something we teach; we hold this up as a matter of Christian freedom. And of course, the call is to be a good parent, to instruct your children in things of the gospel, but not baptizing a how. A lot of times churches get into real trouble when you baptize the how. Does that make sense?

Last week, I also distinguished between binding consciences and binding actions. Churches can say, "We're going to meet at a particular time on a Sunday morning." During COVID, we talked about some of the restrictions that churches chose to say: "We're gonna wear masks, not meet; wear masks, meet outside, not be outside." You can choose to agree with those or not, but we are binding actions, not binding consciences. We're not telling you that you have to believe the why behind it. We're just saying this is what we're going to do. So that was last week's lesson. I know that some of that was clear as mud.

Preparing for Difficult Conversations

This week, we're going to turn in our class and talk about going from perspective to attitude. My goal in this class is to prepare you to have conversations. I know some of you are already doing this—I'm not acting like you don't do this already. But I'm preparing you to think about your Thanksgiving table with your family, people who may really radically disagree with you, and how you prepare to do so.

Today, we're going to do a short study on the sons of thunder. Two passages, one in Mark, one in Luke, about brothers James and John. If you will get in small groups, I want you to read these passages together, and then there are three questions there to answer. You'll need to be at a group of about four or five to be able to do these. So you ready? Set. Go.

Alright. Let's talk real quick. If I could have your attention, let's come back together. So if I could ask, how would you characterize the first question—how would you characterize James and John, the sons of thunder? What words would you use to describe them?

Group responses: Eager. Reactionary. Impulsive. Self-seeking. Fervent. Overconfident. They had a helicopter mom.

There's a mix of faith here. They clearly believe Jesus can wipe this village out, but then there's an eagerness to use that power, but also totally missing Jesus' heart.

It's impossible to really answer question number two—it's more of a curiosity. If you had to characterize what you guess maybe their approach was to the Roman Empire, what would you say? Do you have any guesses about what group they might have come from? Somewhere between Zealot and Pharisee?

The nickname "sons of thunder" comes from one of these passages—that's why they were nicknamed that. How do you think that Jesus regarded them from this passage? How do the other disciples regard them?

Group responses: Maybe annoyed with these guys? Some resentment or jealousy?

It's interesting that these two men are in that inner circle with Jesus. Peter, James, and John. And you know enough about Peter to know that he is also not a calm and cool and collected person. How does Jesus regard them? Do you have a sense from these passages?

Group responses: Understanding, but direct—he's redirecting them. The leaders really serve. Instead of lording it over them. He's compassionately redirecting them. Take it down a notch. Take it down a level.

I think it's interesting that Jesus is seeing all of this passion in them, but also knows that they can be shaped into who he wants them to be.

There seems to be patience there. There's not a rejection of them. In verse 39, they say, "We are able." Like, that's clearly false—they clearly can't crucify, they're not gonna do that. But he doesn't reject them for their longing. It's as if the fact that they want to sit with his right hand and his left hand matters to him.

There's some false ambition there. The desire is itself a good thing. He doesn't reject their desire. The reason I picked these passages and wanted to focus on these two of Jesus' disciples who are part of his inner circle was that one of the things that I think is really essential for us to be able to move into conversations with other people is to let go of a sense of certainty that I'm right. And that's really dear to us. In fact, American Christians, evangelicals in particular, are known for our confidence and being sure of ourselves. That's a good thing to be sure of our faith and trusting Christ, but being sure with regard to things that are in that outer ring is potentially dangerous. And it prevents us from being able to move toward other people with genuine curiosity.

I want you to think about how you ask questions. There's a way to ask a question that people know you're not asking a question—you're making a statement. Think of an example of when a question's really a statement. "Are you really gonna wear that today?" Anybody ever said that to their kids or had that said to you? That's a statement. It's not a question. It's not curious. It's coming from a position of I'm telling you. Any other examples of a question that's really a statement? "Are you gonna do your homework?" "Do you really believe that?" When we think about what it means to enter into conversations with people, particularly people who are sure of themselves and certain about a position that maybe you're like, "I don't know about that"—people can always tell where you're coming from. The perspective that you bring to this conversation and the way that you ask a question, whether you are genuinely curious and wanting to engage them, wanting to understand them, wanting to know them, wanting to understand what makes them tick. I wanna know you. Help me understand you. You have things in your background that shape why you think the way you do, who you are. Help me understand you. Versus, "I'm gonna win a debate. I've got a point to prove, and you already know what it is." That's the thing.

I want to point to Philippians chapter two, verses one through four.

If there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourself. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. — Philippians 2:1-4

Verse three is the one I want to highlight for today. A key essential skill or heart attitude in engaging conversations is humility. There's another piece of paper at the end of your table. This is a solo exercise. If you take a moment, turn it over so you don't have the picture of the head. You're gonna start on the other side. There's an individual exercise I'd like you to complete. Put a star, check, or circle which answer from each of those questions applies best to you.

I wanted to check in on this morning and on your assessment—how you guys did, how you felt about it. Any thoughts about my little assessment for you, besides that you could tell what the right answers were?

The exercise is helpful to kind of open up more broadly because I think this way of thinking—being more curious, asking more questions—is helpful way beyond just talking about politics. Ensuring our faith, finding out where people are at, why they are where they are. I think that is huge. I have missed a lot of opportunities by not being more curious in this specific area. That's really helpful. Anybody else? Other questions or thoughts or comments about this?

If you're the one person in your family who disagrees with everybody else, they're always gonna perceive you as more aggressive even if you are trying to approach it with belief. I tried to break that one off, but that may have more to do with your family.

I thought the policy question was particularly interesting, but I've struggled with that one because there are places where I think there's a lot of ground for a lot of different views. But that space, in my mind, has narrowed over the last ten years because so many of our policy questions are now questions that scripture speaks to as rapidly—like the nature of marriage or abortion concerns. Those used to be in a pre-political space, but now those are open questions of how do we build on policy. I was trying to figure out where I would land on that because it almost would depend on the policy. And if the policy did cross into biblical places where scripture doesn't hear me.

Let me ask you to look at the little face that's on here, and I want you to take a minute and just write down all the adjectives that describe you. If you are introducing yourself, here's who I am. How do I define myself?

Bald people. Yes. Good. I'm an aunt. I'm a grandfather. I'm a kid. I'm a chemist. All those.

I want to look briefly at two passages. Would somebody read for us from First Corinthians 2:14-16? And while you're looking that up, someone else would like to look at Colossians 1:15-22.

The person without the spirit does not accept the things that come from the spirit of God, but considers them foolishness. And they cannot understand it because they are concerned only through the spirit. The person with the spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments. For who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ. — 1 Corinthians 2:14-16

One of the basic things about who you are as a person who is a Christian is you have the mind of Christ. I want you to write that down on that paper. This is one of the essential things of who you are. When you get up in the morning, you can take lipstick or you could take a dry erase marker and write this on your mirror: "I have the mind of Christ." This is one of the most basic things of being a Christian. This is given to you. You have to develop an ability to live out of this, but this is given to you.

We are once alienated, once far off, brought near, now holy and blameless in his sight. — Colossians 1:15-22

This is who we are fundamentally. The reason I had you write this is because increasingly the way that Americans define themselves is through partisan words—progressive, moderate, conservative. And those are fine words. But if you think about the order of operations of where they land in your life, the one that should be very first and top is: I am in Christ. I am his. I have the mind of Christ. I'm holy and blameless in his sight.

What's happened increasingly over the last couple of years is well-meaning people have started to put modifiers in front of the word Christian. I'm stealing this from Rosaria Butterfield. I think this is brilliant. She says we never put modifiers in front of Christian. There is nothing anytime you modify Jesus, you're taking all the work that Jesus has done and making it into something else. It's adding to the gospel. So when you say "I'm a conservative Christian" or "I'm a gay Christian" or "I'm a progressive Christian," every time you do that, you're not just naming a flavor. You're actually distorting something with regard to the faith.

So it is extremely important that we don't put modifiers on Jesus and even on the Christian faith. Those things can go down the list. I'm a progressive, down the list. I'm a conservative, down the list. But Christ, Christian, in Christ, has got to be number one and unmodified.

Now I know you know what you mean by when you say that, but when you label that, you are doing something that's actually kind of dangerous because it can cause other people to really miss who Jesus is. So keeping that foremost is extremely important to being curious. Again, He's what matters. I have the mind of Christ. I'm in Him. I'm holy and blameless in His sight. Keeping that locked in as central. And everything else has got to fall below that.

I'm not telling you anything you don't know. I'm just reminding you of something that you already do know, which is we don't narrow Jesus.

And once we do, we start getting into danger. And finally, this is where I want to end up for today. I want to encourage you to think, therefore, about what it means to have a thicker political theology.

Now I'm going to define the difference between a thin political theology and a thick one, and this is hard. This is requiring a lot more of Christians than it has done in generations past. We're in a time where we're having to think harder about how we express ourselves and what we say, how we ask questions, how we represent ourselves.

Thin vs. Thick Political Theology

A thin political theology can go down to both sidesism. You know what both sidesism is? It means both sides are equally bad. Both sides are equally corrupt. I can support neither. I don't ever say what I really think because I don't want to offend anybody. I don't want to talk about these things and engage somebody.

A thin political theology votes on one issue. Takes one issue and says, that's my issue. That's how I decide what it is to be a Christian who votes. Without understanding that a lot of what we're seeing in our country is super interconnected. It's super historic. It's got a lot of roots that go a lot of different places. We are where we are not because of one thing or one person.

A thin political theology also contends usually that there is one and only one Christian candidate, one and only one Christian party, one and only one Christian way to vote. Like, this is it. It's very thin because I've already made up my mind. It's really simple. It simplifies, oversimplifies things that are very complex. Just like you're a very complex person.

A thick political theology exists within tensions. Knowing that there's a lot of pull right now. Issues aren't black and white in most cases. A thick political theology refrains from apathy and takes decisive action for democracy. This is what I think is right. I am going to actually make a decision.

A thick political theology doesn't address just the symptoms of a problem, but tries to understand the source of the problem. A thick political theology doesn't just rely on fear and intimidation, but tries to paint a vision for a better future. What is going to lead us toward the best that we can have within this context?

A thick political theology doesn't simply mean to deconstruct things, but tries to reconstruct things. A thick political theology recognizes we're not seeking to create a theocracy, but a democracy. A thick political theology can accept that as much as we want our Christian convictions played out in the public sphere, we always live in a pluralistic society that must make room for people who are different from us and that need to be able to thrive here and must have a hearing in a true democracy.

So a thick political theology means we've got to do more homework. We've got to be really thoughtful. When we talk about policies, policies are not either or. In many cases, looking at what are the implications for this down the line for all these people? Things are not as clear as we'd like them to be. And everybody wants, like I said last week, we all want shortcuts. We all want to create formulas where we don't have to think about things.

Being a Christian right now who is engaging your whole self means you've got to really be thoughtful, and that's really hard. And it's why we also need to be on a team. We need not a political team, but in a church that has people who are different from us, where we practice some of these things, where we know how to disagree with one another. It's so important, again, to be in a church where we lovingly disagree. I hope that you lovingly disagree with me on some of the things I say on Sunday mornings. It shows you're reading your Bible and you're engaging your brain and your heart. I hope that that's a regular thing in our conversations.

We don't settle into community groups or parts of the church where we're like, just with people like me. It is so important that we are in a church that promotes discussion, even disagreement, and deep love.

Right now, in our political moment, people cannot discern the difference between supporting something and affirming. The word affirm means you've got to agree with everything I say. You've got to affirm not just what I believe about me, but my position in every way possible and embrace everything about me. Adults can disagree and still love one another. And to be able to divide affirmation and disagreement and be able to hold those tensions together, that's really important for us as a church.

I know I'm going over time. I want to make sure you make it to worship. Thank you for being here this morning.

Closing Prayer

Father, thank you for the fact that we are in you, that we are no longer alienated, that you consider us holy and blameless, that we in Christ, we have the mind of Christ. We pray, Father, we'd be people who engage others around us with real curiosity. Lord, we pray that we would define ourselves by Christ alone as the central fact of who we are. We pray we would live in a place not as James and John's who are seeking to call down fire because people disagree with us. But Lord, we pray that we would understand and use our brains and engage one another. We pray this in Christ's name. Amen.

Thanks everybody. Thank you for listening to our CTK Raleigh sermons podcast. CTK is a community rooted in the depth of the gospel, refined by hard conversations, CTK fueled by meaningful relationships, and committed to redemptive work in Raleigh. If you have questions about our sermon content or about our church in general, please visit our website at ctkrally.org.