Chip Shots

Let’s just say it wasn’t a good day. The beautiful monsoon storm that dumped 1 ½ inches of rain in Cave Creek? I loved it, but my septic tank certainly did not. It will cost me several thousand dollars to have it fixed. Ouch! I feel like suing somebody. I am really angry to be put in this situation after less than a year in my brand new home. In times like these, my Christian faith is decidedly inconvenient. I rather wish I had no conscience. I want to lash out, to make threats, to rant and rave. I see people do it all the time and it doesn’t seem to bother them. Why should I be any different? That little voice inside my head, the one that says, “Be careful, Steve. You don’t want to go there” – you know that voice, don’t you? – it drives me crazy. I wish it would just go away. But it doesn’t. So I fork out money I do not have to pay for problems I did not create. And it makes me mad. Does that ever happen to you? I suppose it does. In times like these, I derive a lot of help from the r...

It was 4:30 in the morning. I was driving down Cave Creek Road. Half asleep, I balanced a hot cup of coffee in one hand and the steering wheel in the other. I was traveling 62 miles per hour. I know, because that’s what the officer told me. He also mentioned that I had neglected to signal when changing from the left to the right lane. He gave me a little piece of paper to remind me never to do it again. As you might expect, I wasn’t too pleased. Are we ever? I suppose it’s therapeutic, but I’ve been musing (and commiserating) about this experience for a few weeks now. Why do we need speed limits? Why do we blatantly violate them? And why are we so offended when we get caught? What does it say about human nature? I can name that tune in one word: Depravity. Or two: Original Sin. I know these are not very popular ideas today. We prefer to think that humans are inherently good. We like to believe that self-centeredness is the result of poor upbringing, or poor education, or poverty, or su...

Tamar. Rahab. Ruth. Bathsheba. Mary. These extraordinary women are members of an exclusive club, one usually reserved for men: they are listed in the Bible as ancestors of Jesus (Matthew 1). You might imagine that these women had to be pretty special to be included in the official record of Jesus’ lineage. And they were. But not for the reasons you might expect. For example, Tamar got on the list by disguising herself as a prostitute. She did this to trick the father of her dead husband into having a baby by her. She succeeded; the resulting child became one of Jesus’ early ancestors. (The boy’s name was Perez. His father and his grandfather were the same man!) And Rahab? Whereas Tamar only pretended to be a prostitute, Rahab made a career of it. She left her wayward ways behind before she became one of Jesus’ grandmothers, but she never lost the nickname, “Rahab the Harlot.” Perhaps even more startling is the trait that Rahab shared with her future daughter-in-law, a woman named Ruth....

What responsibility does a Christ-follower have toward the government? If you think this is a difficult question in today’s arena, consider the quandary for believers in first century Rome. They had no rights, their government had no conscience, and their religion was virtually illegal. What was the appropriate Christian response to such a godless government? The answers were not easy then – and they are not easy now. At the risk of oversimplifying a complicated question, may I offer a few suggestions? Among other things, I have found it helpful to hold two complementary principles in dynamic tension. Like twin ends of a pole, keeping them in balance has helped me walk the tightrope of Christian conscience in the face of competing political viewpoints. In the first case, for example, we are to respect the authority of the state. “Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established” (Romans 13:1). No doubt, these wer...