March Madness - Bible-Style

It all began with an innocuous text exchange last weekend. A couple of buddies and I who have an ongoing thread about our mutual basketball interest were texting about the NAIA and NCAA tournaments. All of the sudden the chat veered into biblical territory when one of my friends jokingly suggested we come up with a 64 person bracket of Bible characters.

I happened to be in one of those fun brainstorming moods and decided to tackle the idea head-on. Before I share my bracket, let me share some of the guidelines I chose to follow:

• First, the Trinity is not eligible nor are any angelic beings. That's just unfair, we're sticking with actual human people from the Bible's history. 
  
  
• Second, because the Old Testament makes up 59% of the Bible, we ought to divide up the characters to reflect that majority. Since there are four regions, my goal was to get close to 75% of characters (3 out of 4 regions). So I decided on the following arrangement.The Beginnings Region is comprised of characters from Genesis. The Law Region, reflective of the people of God being formed under the Mosaic Covenant, covers the Exodus events through the establishment of Saul as King over Israel. The Kingdom Region is comprised of those who lived during Israel's Kingdom days all the way through the years detailed in the Gospels. These three regions would comprise 65% of the books of the Bible. The fourth region is the New Covenant Region which spans the rest of the New Testament after the Gospels. Now, some in the NC region were key characters in the Gospels, especially the disciples. But I am placing them in the later region because that was the timeframe in which they were in their most significant roles.
   
• Third, I chose these 64 people as those who I found as the "most important" to the Biblical narrative. That is sort of nebulous and subjective, but it was my call. 
  
  
• Fourth, I want this tournament to be based on each voter's favorite character. This is not who was most important to God's plan or anything like that. That would be too obvious but also contrary to Jesus' words about "the least being the greatest". Determine these matchups based on who you like most or relate to the best.

Without further ado, I'll share a screenshot of my bracket and after the page break I'll gratuitously share my a breakdown of each region. I'll also attempt to get voting started on a Facebook page and maybe Twitter so keep an eye out for that.

Christians and Leaders and Christian Leaders

Having devoted much of my life to studying God's Word, I will occasionally stumble upon a randomly interesting observation. One such observation came up in my prep for yesterday's sermon and since it's been an entire month since I posted, I figured I would try fleshing it out some more here.

My randomly "profound" idea? 

Christians have often had a weird relationship with their leaders.

It is as if we are on a constant search for the person God is raising up "for such a time as this". Whether it be a political candidate or a new pastor/spiritual leader, we are often all-too eager to fall head-over-heels for someone. And the higher the stakes, the higher the pedestal we put them on. 

This then leads to leader-worship, where some start to believe that since God's hand is on that individual, since he sovereignly put them in that position, that makes them untouchable. They are infallible, impervious to mistakes, you can't really criticize them because God's favor has rested on them.

Maybe we don't theologically believe those things are absolutely true but practically we treat them as such. We will jump all over the smallest misstep of an opponent while turning a blind eye to exceptionally problematic issues with our leader(s). 

This is not a new phenomena. Israel's history is littered with kings who operated according to such beliefs. In the middle ages, there was the doctrine of "the divine right of kings". The American concept of "Manifest Destiny" can probably linked to this concept too. 

When we buy into this perspective that venerates our leaders, we fail to understand that God's favor is not some sort of force-field that makes them invulnerable and perfect. 

Even if God's divine appointment could be proven, it is not cover for anything and everything they might do or say. Read about David's life, especially the last part of his reign. Or Joash in 2 Kings 11-12. It is all too easy for imperfect human beings to lose their way. 

Only one leader in all of human history has a spotless record. And he was God-in-human-flesh. And he was crucified.

Let me just wrap this up by encouraging us all to do two things:

1. Pray for our leaders. Christians are commanded to (1 Tim. 2) of course. Yet we should do so because we realize they are put on a pedestal that comes with a heavy weight. We should pray because we realize how easy it is to trip up. 
   
   
2. Don't be blindly loyal to anyone but Jesus. If my favorite pastor or my preferred political candidate messes up, I should be wise enough to recognize it and give voice to my disapproval. Jesus alone is worthy of our complete allegiance because he has not and will not let us down.

We have often had a weird relationship with our leaders. Doing these two things will allow us to live within the tension of supporting those God has put over us but not blindly following them into whatever folly they may be chasing.

Coming down off a high - Sermon Snippets

I've taken a break from blogging but now I hope to be "back and better than ever" (s/o to Mike & Mike). I'm putting "Music Monday" on hiatus for now and going to bring back "Sermon Snippets" moving forward. 

These posts will feature tidbits and/or last minute cuts from my sermons that I find interesting. One common problem pastors face is deciding what to cut from their messages - or rather, not realizing they need to cut material out to keep their audience focused. I'm writing a commentary on 1-2 Kings currently so there should be plenty of material. To keep up with my sermon series, you can listen here.

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Being a sports fan, I see it all the time. A team pulls off a big win only to fall flat on their face against a lesser opponent. This is a theme that threads throughout Scripture's story. 

• Israel is conquering the Promised Land and defeats the unconquerable city of Jericho. Then they turn around and are trounced when trying to attack the much less formidable Ai (Josh.6-7)
• David is anointed to be the next king and defeats Goliath in their famous battle (1 Sam.16-17). He then spends years dodging spears and hiding in caves until he gets the throne (2 Sam. 2-5).
• Elijah confronts and defeats the prophets of Baal on Mt. Carmel (1 Kings 18) only to be overwhelmed by discouragement soon after (1 Kings 19).
• In less that 24 hours, Peter goes from boldly vowing to never abandon Jesus to denying him three times (Matt.26:33-35, 69-75)

Everything about 1 Kings 8 points to this being another probable letdown. This chapter is an account of one of the most glorious worship services of all time. Solomon completes the Temple of the Lord in Jerusalem and the nation dedicates it with a special celebration. 

So when the music has faded and the offerings have all been offered, God visits Solomon to offer him instruction that will greatly help him and his people not fall into that trap. Both positively and negatively, he reminds the king of the importance of undivided loyalty to God and faithfully following his Law. 

Faithfulness to God needs to guide us, whether we're experiencing victory or struggling with defeat. God takes notice and truly cares - not just that we reach a spiritual mountaintop - but also that we use it to grow and be better followers of Jesus. Anything else is just sentimentality or emotionalism not true spirituality. 

Book Blog

This week's featured book was one I caught the second time around. 

By that I mean that I didn't read it the first time I had the chance. It was one of my Bible or theology classes in undergrad and I remember Dr. Soto encouraging us to read it and do a short response paper for extra credit. I must have felt that I didn't have the extra time to put in the extra effort and I'd learn later how much I missed out.

A few years later, as an intern at my home church, our senior pastor had our elders and staff read it for discussion purposes. I'm pretty sure I read it through at a much quicker pace than our discussions because I quickly discovered what a beautiful piece of literature it was and what a profound look into David's life it was. 

A Tale of Three Kings was written by Gene Edwards in 1980. While it is centered on King David, it traces his life in relation to two other kings - Saul and Absalom. 

The central theme is that God desires his people to embrace humility and brokenness. But even that summary barely does the book justice. It's format is one like a play with short scenes reflective of the biblical text. Edwards does interpretively "fill in the blanks" with some details and conversations but never strays from the spirit of the text.

In the first part of the book, Edwards observes David's responses to Saul - submitting to God and refusing to manipulate things to get what is rightfully his. And he keenly demonstrates that those are the same responses David has towards Absalom, who does rebel against the King and seeks to manipulate to get what he believes is his.

The applications that are made both subtly and overtly are what gives this book it's power. Edwards connects the dots to our present day by showing how the leadership issues in play in the stories of Saul, David, and Absalom are vital questions pastors and spiritual leaders must answer in our day. 

How will we react when the leaders above us seem to be unqualified or misguided?

How will we respond when our authority is challenged?

How will we leave if we are forced out of or called away from a leadership position?

This book made a significant impression on me and I enjoy re-reading it every couple years. The truth of it's insights have been validated again and again the more I've been in ministry. Interestingly enough, I got to observe the very same pastor embody these principles a year or two later after reading the book. 

I've come to believe that David wasn't "a man after God's own heart" because of his courage or passion. I believe he earned that title because of his brokenness and repentance. I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure it's a big piece of the puzzle.