Provo. In Three Tweets.

Last week Rachel and I got back from Provo, where we'd spent a few days ministering and sightseeing with some great friends of ours. Here are three tweets that well sum up what i'm thinking about, post Provo.

Any step away from the sufficiency and supremacy of Jesus in all things is a step towards cultdom.
— Ed Goode (@Ed_Goode) July 7, 2014

I don't think cultdom is a word, (and neither does my spellchecker) but you know what i mean. Provo is 98% Mormon, which means that everyone you meet is LDS, or lapsed LDS, or pick and choose LDS. There are some weird and not so wonderful things that the LDS church teaches and practices, but in the final reckoning, it all comes down to their view of Jesus. Simply, for the LDS Church, as for every other derivation from Christianity, and every other false religion, Jesus isn't quite enough. Sure, just like everyone else, they want Jesus on their team. They want Jesus in their paradigm, but as a cheerleader, not as a Saviour. As an example, not as a payment. Every step we take away from 'Jesus paid it all,' is a step towards a man focused, man pleasing, man imagined religion.

As indicated by the next tweet:

A man just asked, "How do you guys make it without temples, no priesthood, and no authority?" Bryant said, "We have the Bible." #winprovo
— Logan Michael Wolf (@loganwolf85) July 4, 2014

Provo hosts one of the biggest 4th July festivals in the country, so for part of the trip we helped work the New Morning Church booth there. We were sort of out of the way down an alley, so my suspicion is this guy wanted to come and find us. You see how tweet one links with tweet two? Jesus isn't sufficient in the LDS system, so they need a priesthood and temples. Jesus isn't sufficient in the LDS system, so neither is He authoritative. It's a killer. Get away from Jesus, and His Word and you're on sliding scale with women bishops on one end, and your own planet when you die on the other. In our lives, and in our ministry, we must be careful, we must labour all the time, to make sure that we're not just paying lip service to Jesus, but heart service. If not, we'll be cut adrift into the wasteland of our own ideas, and today's cultural mores.

Want to experience a foreign missions trip without leaving the States? Go to Utah.
— Ed Goode (@Ed_Goode) July 9, 2014

I've spent all of nine nights in Provo, so i'm no expert, but it's a different place. Provo is blessed/plagued with moralism. Blessed, because your car probably won't be keyed by a drunk college student in the middle of the night, plagued, because everyone thinks their OK, jack. It feels different. Their history is not America's history, their way of life not America's way of life. Their monuments are not America's monuments. I think it was CS Lewis that said if the devil ran a town the churches would be full (think about it) and i can only imagine he was on his way home from an undocumented trip to the Beehive state when he wrote those words. In ministry, and particularity youth ministry, particularly in the Bible belt, we must slough off every temptation to present a moral Gospel, and instead, with Bibles open and guns ablaze, preach the risky, dirty, bloody, leper-touching, i'm alive so let's have breakfast on the beach, Gospel of Jesus Christ and Him crucified.

Don't Waste Your Summer

Summer's here. I'm writing this on the Saturday morning after TCS graduation ceremony, which means, if you go to Trinity at least, summer is officially here.

I can't tell you that i'm not excited. I love summers in North Carolina. Growing up in a country that often skipped that season makes you all the more glad for a summer that starts in mid-May and runs through mid-September. Marrying a teacher makes you even more glad. I'll be a while before i set my alarm for 5.15 am again. So of course i'm excited about that.

I love summer because i get quantity time with my wife, because i get to travel, this year to Chicago and Provo. I love summer because it's an opportunity to breathe, and relax, and enjoy.

But summer has it's dangers too. Summer can shrivel your soul. Don't let it.

The routine of the school year, though tiring, is a great help. You're used to getting up five days a week, so getting up on Sunday is less of a chore. You're used to working and reading, so time in the Bible seems less of an issue. But what can happen in the summer? Nights get later, and temptations get greater.

Summer will shrivel your soul if you let it. And i'm not talking about gross sin, or even consistent bad decisions about how to spend your time, or with whom to spend your time, i'm talking about the passion of your heart in the summer.

How hard to be stirred by the Word of God on a Sunday morning if you went to be at 3am. How hard to make it back to church on a Sunday night when it's sunny, in the mid 80s and the grill is firing. These aren't things we need to deal with in December.

Summer exists to give us a taste of Heaven. Summer is a Facebook message from your long distance girlfriend. When i visited the States before i moved here, i didn't Facebook Rachel anymore, we held hands and went to Bojangles. I didn't let the message distract me from the messenger.

Don't let summer distract you from Jesus. Use the time summer gives you to pray, to read, to think and to share. use the beauty of a slow summer sunset to think on the beauty of the Gospel. use the freedom to serve. Go on a mission trip, be faithful to church, call your youth pastor and take him out to lunch. Make sure your affections are higher for your Saviour than for the beach. Make sure you priorities are knowing God better, rather than working on your jump shot. Love the messenger, not the message.

Make sure summer sustains your soul, don't let it shrivel your soul.