So He Can Attend A Baseball Tournament?

Eric Liddell refused to run on Sunday, the Christian Sabbath,
in the 100-metres race during the 1924 Summer Olympics in Paris.

If you read the article which was the subject of my post about Mars Hill Church, you may have noticed an interesting detail to the story; a detail that caught my eye anyway. The article was about Westboro Baptist Church picketing Mars Hill Church and how Pastor Mark Driscoll led his church in responding with Christ-like love. It's really a great story. The detail that caught my eye was a brief statement toward the end of the article. The article states that on the particular Sunday that Westboro Baptist had planned to picket Mars Hill, Pastor Mark's sermon was prerecorded so he could attend a baseball tournament that his son was playing in. I understand this to mean that he missed Sunday services in order to go to this baseball tournament. The Pastor was not at Sunday services with his church?

Growing up in the Catholic Church, my parents and our priests instilled in me the value for attending Mass on Sundays. When I was in the Army, on my own and away from home, I attended Mass sporadically. In college I really didn't attend at all; but once our first child was born, Margaret and I began attending Mass again on a regular basis. If there was something happening on Sunday that prevented us from attending, we would go to Mass on Saturday evening which was permissible in the Catholic Church and 'counted' as Sunday Mass. There was some security knowing that the church was there and the priests were going to be there to perform the service. Never was service cancelled and the priests always showed up. I've heard of pastors broadcasting services across town to multiple church sites, but a pastor prerecording a sermon and not evening showing up?

I know that Sunday is not the Sabbath that we, Torah-Observant Messianics, observe; but Christians do believe that Sunday is the Sabbath or their Sabbath, as in the 4th Commandment. Whether Christians have the day wrong or not is not what I am concerned about here. The Biblical principle of Sabbath observance should be, theoretically, the same whether you worship on Saturday or on Sunday. I know some Messianics may get up in arms about this comment and may find it wrong and/or impossible for me to compare Christians with Messianics, Saturday with Sunday; and that Sabbath observance cannot be done on the wrong day. I've thought about all of this, just hear me out. My point is this: Adonai commanded us to rest and convocate on the Sabbath. My questions are this: 1) What does it mean for us to rest on the Sabbath? 2) What does it mean for us to convocate on the Sabbath? 3) Finally, is attending a baseball tournament (or a similar event) a valid, Biblical reason to break the commandment to convocate (and potentially the commandment to rest) and miss Sabbath Services?

I am finding it necessary to explore these questions and more regarding the 4th Commandment and Messianic Sabbath observance from an Hebraic perspective. I'm really not too concerned about Mars Hill and whether Mark Driscoll missed Sunday services or not; my concern is for our local community and the development of a Sabbath halacha for our congregation. I hope to delve into this subject over a series of posts. My goal is to begin a discussion for the leaders in our community regarding Sabbath observance for Messianics today.

Below are some passages worth looking into:

Genesis 2:1-3
Exodus 16:23-30
Exodus 20:8-11
Exodus 23:12
Exodus 31:13-17
Exodus 35:2,3
Leviticus 19:3
Leviticus 23:3
Leviticus 26:2
Deuteronomy 5:12-15

Nehemiah 13:16-19
Ezekiel 20:12

Matthew 12:1-13
Matthew 24:20
Mark 2:18-28
Mark 3:1-12
Mark 15:42-16:13
Luke 4:14-30
Luke 13:10-17
Luke 14:1-6
Luke 23:50-56
John 7:14-36
John 19:31-37

Acts 15:6-21

Colossians 2:16-23
Hebrews 4:1-10


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Making Witchcraft Commonplace

Driving into work this morning I heard a radio ad by Car Toys that disturbed me. I looked up the ad on their website so I could hear it again and I found out that the new Car Toys slogan is "It's Almost Magic." As expected, they have a few more radio spots based on this theme and a couple of television commercials too. The idea behind the campaign is that customers are so surprised by the way Car Toys transformed their vehicle that they are now convinced Car Toys is using magic. The commercial that I heard is titled "Illegal warlockery". It features a teenaged girl who is giving feedback to Car Toys about the work they did on her mother's minivan.

You can listen to the ad here:

I'm not coming down on Car Toys as a company or the products and services that they provide. I love good quality sound and I've heard they do some good work. In fact, if I had a few extra bucks I'd like to put a new stereo in our family Suburban and maybe a GPS; but anyway...

I get the idea behind the ad campaign—Wow, Car Toys does some really cool stuff to cars; so cool that they could not have done it without the help of magic. I get it, pretty neat concept.

What bothers me is the way terms related to witchcraft are thrown around and made to seem so commonplace. I understand, it's a secular radio station, if I don't like it I can turn it off, whatever. My point is this: I have never heard witchcraft talked about so lightly in an advertisement and presented in such a way that makes it seem like everyone does it. For example, the girl in the ad, figuring that Car Toys is into magic, says, "I'm super stoked that you're into the dark arts." First of all, my children would probably ask me what 'super stoked' means and then they would ask what the 'dark arts' are. Consider that—they are called dark arts. Since when is dark, as in the occult, a good thing? And why is this teenaged girl stoked about dark arts? Do her parents know she is into the dark arts? Do they approve of this?

Then the girl says in a normal everyday kinda tone "...I do love witchery, so call me." You might be thinking, "Michael, don't you watch TV? Haven't you seen all the vampire shows? What's the big deal? This stuff is everywhere." Well, no. I don't watch TV and I haven't for over 10 years now. And yes, I have heard of the vampire shows; that's why I don't watch TV! We don't read the Harry Potter books either or any other books that glamorize witchcraft. When she was very young, my oldest daughter threw away all of the Disney books in our library that mentioned magic—and that was MOST of the Disney books. This was her idea because we taught her early on that witchcraft was not of Adonai. Back to the commercial—is witchcraft really that common in our society that we think it's okay for an average teenaged girl to casually admit over the airwaves that she loves witchery? Is this okay or something that we should just overlook? If it is, our society is further down the tubes than I thought. How many people have heard this commercial and thought, "How nice, my daughter and all her friends are into witchery too."

Her final comment is what put me over the edge. She ends her feedback by telling Car Toys, "We should read tarot cards or like, listen to my boyfriends mix-tape." If you listened to the YouTube commercial above, this is what you heard her say. But what they aired on the radio was something different. Tarot cards are bad enough but instead of the 'mix-tape' comment she said, "We should read tarot cards or like, burn some sage." I took this as a reference to marijuana (which I haven't totally discounted); but after a bit of research, I found that burning sage is an occultic practice used in cleansing a home of evil spirits. Why do we even need to mention these pagan rituals in commercials and put ideas into the minds of our impressionable children? Since when has the occult been a good thing?

The other radio spots are not any better. I have not watched the television commercials and at this point, I don't plan to. What it boils down to is this—we live in a fallen world that is getting darker and darker. We, as believers in Messiah Yeshua, need to become brighter and brighter. I pray that the topic of witchcraft never becomes commonplace in my home and in the minds of my family.



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Christ-Like Love Demonstrated At Mars Hill

Fred Phelps, Westboro Baptist Church

Remember the passage in Scripture where the apostle Paul organized a protest against a church that he thought was sinning? Him, Barnabas and Timothy held up big bright colored signs, picketing in front of the entrance, yelling at the people as they entered the church. Remember that? Oh yeah—it didn't happen. As soon as I began reading this book about Biblical conflict resolution I coincidentally stumble upon an article about a recent conflict between two churches. This past Sunday in Seattle, Washington, the Westboro Baptist Church picketed Mars Hill Church because they believe that Mars Hill teaches lies about God. Mars Hill is the church of popular pastor, speaker and author Mark Driscoll.

If you've never heard of the Westboro Baptist Church, just do an Internet search and you will quickly find out who they are. Although they call themselves Baptists, this group is not associated with or accepted by any of the many Baptist denominations here or abroad. They have a history of protesting events wielding signs that contain crude messages of condemnation. According to the article Fred Phelps, the leader of the Westboro Baptist Church, told CNN in 2006, "You can't preach the Bible without preaching the hatred of God." There is a lot that can be said about this statement and the actions and beliefs of the Westboro Church; but I'll just mention a few of my concerns about this statement. First, what exactly does God hate? We have to first identify in the Text what God hates and make sure we are not inserting our own pet peeves in this list. Secondly, did God call the church to focus solely on the things He hates? What is the purpose and the role of the pastor and the church? Are they supposed to be consumed and preoccupied with the sins of the heathen, rubbing transgressions in their faces? Finally, is this method of callous public ridicule displaying Christ-like love; a love that leads to repentance? How many people have actually repented and come to a saving faith in Messiah Yeshua as a result of these protests? This display of hatred is precisely what I see between denominations and churches today; of course not to the same degree of anger and ridiculousness, but it's still there.

If this happened at your church, how would you respond? If you had a few days notice, how would you prepare? Mark Driscoll was made aware of the planned protest through his facebook page. He had a few days to prepare and I applaud him for the way he reacted to the situation—he reached out with love. What a perfect opportunity for him to lead his community in demonstrating Christ-like love and character. He could have reacted in the same way that others have in the past by fighting-fire-with-fire, but instead, he applied a bit of spiritual-judo. This countercultural, Biblical, Christ-like response caught the attention of newspapers across the country. What a great testimony and example for the Body of Messiah.

Read the article here: Church welcomes Westboro protests, even though they deeply disagree



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Make Every Effort To Keep Unity

I am now starting yet another book on love. This one is called If You Bite And Devour One Another : Biblical Principles For Handling Conflict by Alexander Strauch. When I met with Alex back in April he told me the key to a healthy Church and healthy relationships is love, Christ-like love. Once we can grasp this concept and follow after the example of our Messiah, our communities and our families will thrive. He then gave me three of his books on love. This one is his latest book, which was released in May. He explained to me that years ago, when he was a young Christian, he saw conflict and anger, bitterness and fighting between mature Christians in his community. He could not understand how a believer in Yeshua Messiah could behave in such a manner. This experience is what sparked a desire in him to begin studying about Christ-like love. He's been studying and writing about love ever since.

If You Bite And Devour is about conflict resolution within the body. In the book Strauch explores God's way of handling conflict so congregations may experience peace and unity. The goal of the book is to provide a better understanding of what the Bible teaches about conflict and to help believers learn how to respond to conflict according to biblical principles. At this point I've only read the introduction during my lunch break; but I am eager to start digging into this book this evening. Another thought that Alex shared with me is that the more we study and teach Christ-like love, the more we will begin to love like Christ did.

"We must recognize that every conflict is an opportunity to display Christlike character, the wisdom from above, and the reality of the gospel in our lives. Every conflict is a test: Will we respond according to the Spirit, displaying its beautiful fruit, or will we react in the ugliness of the flesh? Every conflict reveals whether we practice what we preach, whether we are doers of the Word or hearers only. Every conflict indicates the genuineness of our faith."
-- Alexander Strauch from If You Bite And Devour 

Download sample chapters of this book here: Bite And Devour



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Have You Left Your First Love?

I just finished another short book about love called Love Or Die : Christ's Wake-Up Call To The Church by Alexander Strauch. The book is based on Revelation 2:4 and is an encouragement for churches to begin to study about, pray for, teach on, model, guard and practice love, Christ-like love. Stauch explains that today, we don't hear enough about love in the Ekklesia of Yeshua. This is true. We need more of it; not just taught but demonstrated. In order to understand what Christ-like love is, we have to first study it in the Scriptures. In the back of the book there is a study guide that digs deeper into the examples of Chirst-like love (here is the teachers guide). This is another book that I would recommend for leaders who desire to have their communities and families overflowing with Christ-like love.

Download sample chapters of this book here: Love or Die



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