Musings of a Hardlining Moderate

Broken But Resilient: I’m Already a Campus Pastor (Miniblog #215)

Carson T. Clark — Thu, 23 May 2013 21:10:22 +0000

This past year I volunteered with Unite InterVarsity at Baylor University. It has been a restorative ministry context; God’s means of grace in healing my body, conforming my heart, renewing my mind, lifting my spirit, teaching me to love my neighbor, and renewing my hope for the Body of Christ. A recent example brought me to tears. One of the graduating guys told me that, regardless of whether it’s ever formally recognized by the Anglican Church or any other ecclesiastical body, the fruit of my life evidences that I’m already a pastor. He said I’m already shepherding a community, proclaiming the Gospel, making disciples, loving the less fortunate, serving the Church, and helping build the Kingdom. He finished by saying, “You’re severely broken but God has used it in our lives. We can’t believe your resilience. Your time with us has proven your calling, health, fitness for ministry. That’s why InterVarsity hired you to be Unite’s campus staff… Don’t ever try to be like most pastors. You’ve got a unique calling. It’s difficult because it’s important.” These words caused my knees to buckle. I’m not exactly an emo kinda guy, but I fell to the ground weeping hysterically. Many of you know I’ve been dealing with PTSD symptoms mostly from twice having my ordination halted at the 11th hour. Fun times. Suffice to say, this has been a really shitty season of life. There’s no other way to say it. Yet the Lord spoke to me through my friend: I may not ever pastor a church or be formally ordained by a denomination, but I’m already a campus pastor serving the Church. As a painfully self-critical and transparent kinda fellow, I’m consistently the first to acknowledge my fallenness, finitude, and foolishness. Nevertheless, I’ve been faithful to the Lord’s calling upon my life to be a campus pastor. No one can take that away.

A Prayer of Blessing for Unite InterVarsity at Baylor University

Carson T. Clark — Thu, 23 May 2013 18:24:52 +0000

I prayed this last weekend at Rec Week, but also wanted to share it with those students who couldn’t make it and those who support our community with prayer and finances:

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,

I praise you and thank you for Unite InterVarsity.¹1.Like all InterVarsity chapters we’re interdenominational. Our all-encompassing vision of the Gospel causes us to place a strong emphasis on community, Bible study, prayer, discipleship, evangelism, musical worship, christian ecumenism, social justice, gender equality, multi-ethnicity, environmentalism, and serving others.
Thank you for your love and compassion.
Thank you for our friendships.
Thank you for our Bible studies.
Thank you for our times of prayer.
Thank you for our musical worship.
Thank you for our leadership meetings.
Thank you for our heart-to-heart lunch conversations.
Thank you for our many hours of sports and board games.
Thank you for the opportunities to serve and love and grow and learn.
Thank you for the ways in which you faithfully revealed yourself this past year.

I ask for your continued grace and favor.
Enable us to be your hands and feet.
Grant us the love to serve the world you created,
the courage to proclaim your Gospel,
the wisdom to pursue your Kingdom,
and the humility to be your Church.

Give us your vision for Baylor University.
Empower us to live faithful and consistent lives.
Heal our bodies.
Conform our hearts.
Renew our minds.
Restore our relationships.
Lift our spirits.
Protect us from all harm.
Help us overcome temptation.
Prepare us to be a witnessing community that brings honor to you.
May we always be sensitive to your still, small voice.
I ask for your blessing this year and in the many to come.

Brothers and sisters, the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in the knowledge and love of God, and of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord: And the blessing of God Almighty, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, be among you and remain with you always.

Amen.

Miniblog #214: John Piper, Twitter, Oklahoma Tornadoes, Etc.

Carson T. Clark — Thu, 23 May 2013 15:37:05 +0000

Though I’ve seen plenty of allusions to John Piper’s recent tweet about the Oklahoma tornadoes, I still don’t know what was said. That’s intentional. I hide the content just as soon as I recognize it in my Facebook newsfeed.¹ Chances are he was trying to comfort the brokenhearted with God’s sovereignty and it backfired, as tends to happen.1.Candidly, I just won’t care what John Piper says anymore. Nor do I care anymore about what people think about what John Piper said. I’ve learned to avoid both the Totally Reformed, Mark Driscoll crowd Post-Conservative, Rachel Held Evans crowd. In my experience, both do little but further the lowbrow drivel that dominates social media. There was probably an unhelpful Old Testament reference thrown in there for good measure. Whatever. I just wish that my thoughtful friends would stop contributing this reactionary rubbish to the social media cacophony. Seriously. All too often it seems juvenile and uninspired. Take some responsibility, folks. Don’t post whatever is the easiest way to get Likes. Elevate the conversation. I’m not suggesting we altogether duck the issue. I am suggesting we take the time to develop some penetrating commentary before we contribute. If I may adapt the childhood adage we all heard, if you don’t have anything insightful to say then don’t say anything at all. Glean some wisdom from Proverbs and hold your online tongue.

Miniblog #213: I Prefer “Forgive & Give Favor” to “Forgive & Forget”

Carson T. Clark — Wed, 22 May 2013 17:57:09 +0000

Christians often say, “Forgive and forget” as though they’re synonymous or, at the very least, intimately connected actions. I disagree, have never liked that phrase, and am skeptical of its biblical merit. It seems to me that forgiving is a matter of intention whereas forgetting is a matter of ignorance. However one defines sin,¹1.Whether as rebellion against God, that which is detrimental to human flourishing, or some other similar conception. I think God forgives our sins but I don’t think He forgets them. The factual reality hasn’t been expunged from His omniscience.² Take a look at when God wouldn’t let Moses into the Promised Land after he struck his staff against the rock. Did God forgive Moses for this? Yes. Does it appear God forgot Moses’ action? No.2.Now, some may ask about passages like Isaiah 43:25 and Hebrews 8:12 in which it says God will not remember our sins. My response to that comes from Star Trek: The Undiscovered Country.
Captain James T. Kirk: Names, Lieutenant!
Lieutenant Valeris: I do not remember.
Captain Spock: A lie?
Lieutenant Valeris: A choice. Such examples are plentiful throughout Scripture. For a New Testament illustration with our incarnate and resurrected Lord, I would suggest this was also the case with Jesus and Peter. Did Jesus forgive Peter’s betrayal? The biblical texts makes this abundantly clear. Did Jesus forget Peter’s betrayal? Nothing in the text suggests this. For now I’ll avoid the fascinating juxtaposition of the two leaders and their ministries, but what I think is clear is that forgiveness does not require forgetfulness. It’s not as catchy but I prefer something more like, “Forgive and give favor,” which in this case I’m using in its goodwill sense. When I forgive someone, what I’m intentioning to do is put the past behind us and treat the person with restored goodwill.³3.A friend of mine put it this way:
“I would say that forgiveness is the giving up of bitterness or feelings, a canceling of accounts of a sort towards someone else. It does not necessarily include forgetting. I think it is possible to remember something without holding it against them. While a man may forgive someone for breaking into his house and stealing his possessions, it would not be prudent necessarily to leave his house unlocked and not think twice if that man happened to be walking by. I think the nature of forgiveness isn’t necessarily a change of thoughts and the mind as much as it’s a change of the position of the heart towards someone.” My hope would be that others would treat me in the same manner when I need to be forgiven.

Miniblog #212: Thankful for InterVarsity

Carson T. Clark — Fri, 17 May 2013 23:36:48 +0000

We’ve all dealt with a little anxiety on occasion. That’s life. But the last several months I’ve battled severe, capital-A Anxiety for the first time. Amidst that struggle, however, I offer a praise. I’ve shared in a previous blog post that Unite InterVarsity has been God’s means of grace in my life. That continues. Every single time I join them for something–whether prayer or Bible study, discipleship lunches or leadership meetings, board games or shooting hoops, etc.–the Anxiety seems to immediately lift. It’s a much-needed respite that almost feels miraculous. I cannot express how deeply thankful I’ve been for them. Tomorrow morning I’m going to Rec Week. It’s a week long training in which each of the chapters are exhorted toward and prepared for the upcoming year of ministry. This will be my first official event as a campus staff member. Because of my other job commitments I’ll only be able to stay over the weekend, but while I’m there I’ll primarily be helping cast the chapter’s vision. I simply cannot put into words how truly thankful I am both for InterVarsity’s health and this whole ministry opportunity. The Lord has been faithful. Praise be to God.

Miniblog #211: Oh, Yeah! I Forgot I Have a Learning Disability

Carson T. Clark — Thu, 16 May 2013 17:39:48 +0000

It’s funny. I’ve always known there was something amiss about the way my brain worked, but for the longest time I couldn’t put my finger on it.¹ Without knowing it I was concealing the problem by overcoming it. I maximized my strengths, found creative work-arounds, or just plain worked my butt off after my competitive nature and iron will kicked in.1.Tests always took way longer than for everyone else. My reading rate has always been awful. I never used to never read words left to right, pronouncing them phonologically. It’s nearly impossible for me to make out broken English in restaurants. Even short lists are impossible to remember when I only hear the information. The same goes for people’s names. Back when I played basketball it took me much longer than everyone else to learn the plays. Training at new jobs always takes longer. I truly suck at multi-tasking… This list could go on for some time. All of this was normal. That’s why I wasn’t diagnosed with a learning disability until I was 23. And that is why it wasn’t a part of my formative schema growing up. And that, I suspect, is why I still forget that I have a learning disability. Ranging from my being unable to remember details after a work meeting to being painfully slow in learning a card game with friends, I’ve had a number of recent reminders. It has been a fresh wave of frustration followed by an internal, ‘Oh yeah! I really do think differently than most people!’ The trouble is, I live in the United States. You couldn’t custom-build a learning disability that so perfectly conflicts with the value placed on speed and efficiency by American culture.² When people force me to go quick I inevitably make a crap load of mistakes or insert my foot into my mouth, but when I take my time many people assume I’m being lazy or am harboring some ulterior motive.2.Slow and steady doesn’t cut it anymore. It’s a lose-lose scenario. I can intellectually keep up with anyone I’ve ever met but continually feel inadequate, even incompetent, at performing what should be basic tasks.³3.It makes me feel like I suck at life. If there’s a silver lining it’s that remembering anew the LD diagnosis at least helps take off the edge and gets me reoriented.

Submitting to Episcopal Oversight: Turns Out It’s a Perspectivist Issue (Miniblog #210)

Carson T. Clark — Wed, 15 May 2013 21:35:21 +0000

A crucial part of my efforts to rebuild up from mere Christianity has involved taking a fresh look at episcopal oversight. Specifically, what does it mean to submit to one’s bishop? The last couple weeks I’ve been been quietly asking around concerning this whole issue.¹ There was a diversity of answers given… many of them conflicting!1.- What does it mean?
- What doesn’t it mean?
- What are the expectations?
- How are the expectations defined?
- How does one’s conscience fit into the equation?
- Where is there freedom of doctrine and practice?
That sort of thing. Honestly, I’m yet to hear an answer I find even remotely satisfactory. In fact, it became clear that the answers often said far more about the micro-individual than the macro-issue. It seems to me many, but obviously not all, Anglicans like to pretend there’s a certain uniformity of understanding that doesn’t appear to actually exist. Yet they maintain this illusion by projecting their own convictions and practices as embodying said uniform understanding. This realization sent my mind down another path altogether. Instead of looking for the theoretical standard I switched gears and went searching for the practical implications. My tentative conclusion is that, given the tradition’s breadth, there simply is no common definition for what it means to submit to a bishop; it’s always contextually dependent. Submission certainly isn’t purely subjective, but neither is there an objective standard.²2.Outside of the constitution and canons, anyway. It’s a perspectivist issue. It’s always dependent upon the ministry context, regional dynamics, and culture of the diocese or jurisdiction. Equally important are the bishop’s personality type, gifting, and leadership style as well as the relationship between the clergy/laity and his or her bishop. The key, then, is fleshing those things out for one’s own situation. Thus, the question which I’ve been asking³3.i.e. What does it mean to submit to episcopal oversight? has been painfully naive. To quote Rick Perry, “Oops.” What I need to be asking is this: What does it mean for me, in my specific context, to submit to my episcopal oversight? I sense this could be a real breakthrough.

Miniblog #209: Coming to Believe All the More in Cross-Tradition Spiritual Formation

Carson T. Clark — Tue, 14 May 2013 22:42:39 +0000

Suppose I wind up remaining a part of the Anglican tradition. I don’t think the developments and insights from my recent church exploration will result in a boiled down mere Christianity. Rather, I think it’s making me just that much more ecumenical toward other denominational bodies. My commitment to cross-tradition spiritual formation is only being intensified. The danger, of course, is not just putting ‘em all in an ecclesiastical blender and pressing liquify as Brian McLaren once described it. There you lose the beauty, distinctiveness, insights, and values of each; you get a sludge that’s nasty to look at and worthless to use. But I do think it’s possible to carefully and gratefully glean elements from other traditions while remaining faithful to one’s own. That’s my growing vision, anyway.

Church-State Reflections: Why I Couldn’t Have Been an English Anglican Until After WWII (Miniblog #208)

Carson T. Clark — Mon, 13 May 2013 17:03:48 +0000

I hold to what Mark Noll describes as “political Lutheranism.” It’s a two kingdom understanding of the relationship between church and state which recognizes critical distinctions between their functions and purposes. It advocates neither the withdrawal of nor hegemony from Christians.¹1.“All it takes for evil to succeed is good men to do nothing.” “Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” These are the two extremes which are to be principally avoided. Instead Christians are to continuously negotiate how they ought to participate within the public square, and especially politics. There aren’t a lot of hard rules. Instead they must wrestle with how they are to be a faithful presence within the political arena rather than practicing absenteeism or domination, neglect or coercion.²2.It’s no easy task. There are few cut-and-dried answers. And that’s precisely the point. The whole position is predicated upon ongoing discernment. This enables Christians to maintain their allegiance to Christ and His Kingdom alone while at the same time not abandoning the cultural, geo-political, and socio-economic realities. It’s the best, and indeed the only remotely satisfactory, way I’ve found to be in the political world but not of the political world.³3.It ain’t perfect or doctrinaire, but therein lies the beauty. I say all of that to say this: I stand with Roger Williams and many other historic christian figures who were steadfastly opposed to state churches such as the Church of England. Having thought a good deal on this over the past few years, I’ve tentatively concluded that were I English I couldn’t have been Anglican until at least several years after WWII.⁴4.It seems to me it wasn’t until after that time that English nationalism was meaningfully decoupled from the national ecclesiastical institution. Only then would my political Lutheranism likely be tolerated or even welcomed. Shoot, I might still struggle with it a bit today. Despite not believing the American Revolution was a just war, I am thankful for its influence in this regard on this side of the pond.

Not the Narrative You’ve Been Told: The Other Origins of the Religious Right (Miniblog #207)

Carson T. Clark — Sun, 12 May 2013 16:17:01 +0000

Whether you’re still in your teens or now in your mid-40s, if you grew up attending conservative evangelical churches as I did you’ve probably been told a false narrative concerning the rise of the Christian Right as a delayed response to Roe vs. Wade. That makes for a good motivational story but is just plain historically untenable. It’s a recasting of historical events and motivations that just doesn’t align with the reality on the ground. This presentation is by Rev./Dr. Randall Balmer, Episcopalian priest and visiting historian at Emory University’s Candler School of Theology. This 2009 paper is entitled “Mistaken Identity: Jimmy Carter, the Abortion Myth, and the Rise of the Religious Right.” I don’t agree with everything he said. In fact, there are some glaring factual omissions. He neglects any mention of Francis Schaeffer and focuses primarily on those holding the levers of power rather than looking at the grassroots movement that he surely would have for, say, the Civil Rights Movement, as just two examples. Such references would have provided a more balanced account. Indeed, Dr. Balmer’s account here relies too heavily on the so-call Great Man theory of history. In my opinion, his work here needs to be seen in tandem with a cultural history of the same developments. Nevertheless, if imperfect his observations remain salient. His insights are undeniably thought-provoking and his criticisms are truly poignant. Below is a 35 minute presentation. I assure you that it’s well worth your time.