The Craw

Why California

These days my Facebook feed is full-up with stories on why you should leave California. Here are the reasons why I stay:

1. The weather is freaking awesome. I've lived in the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic and have spent extended periods of time in the Northeast and South. Every one of those places (including Texas) is unbearable in summer. Everyone spends their days (and nights) locked away in stale, air-conditioned environments. That moist, hot air also attracts thunderous clouds of insects which we don't have here in Southern California. Our nights (even in summer) are dry and mild.
2. I like variety. Where I live in Santa Clarita (north Los Angeles County) I can drive to the beach in 45 minutes and to snow-capped peaks in 1 hour. I can sit on the banks of a cool stream 15 minutes from my house and hike unreal desert geologic formations that have been featured in every film and TV show from Star Trek to the Twilight Zone with a quick 20 minute jaunt up the freeway. Try that in Missouri or South Carolina.
3. Food. You can get AUTHENTIC Japanese sushi and ramen (not Korean knock-offs), street tacos, Indonesian Nasi Goreng, Korean BBQ, and amazing Italian - that's right, Italian. Why? because chefs from Jakarta to Florence ain't moving to Charlotte, NC in droves to set up shop. I know Charlotte probably has a great restaurant scene but Cali has it in spades!
4. Chill factor. We're weird and laid back but that's something I actually appreciate about California. We traditionally got all the creative non-conformists from the rest of the country. I'm an ironic non-conformist: a traditionalist high-church Presbyterial-Anglicany Japanese-American clergyman. Where else would I feel at home?
5. The buck stops here. In the 1980's, when I first became a Christian, all the conservative Christians were leaving California for the Northwest. Oregon and Washington were going to be the new Christian Meccas. How did that work out? I've caught up with allot of these folks who didn't take liturgy, worship and the church seriously. They put their kids in public school up north and hoped all would go well. It didn't. Now their kids are a bunch of angry, pot-smoking apostates. What if they just stayed down here and got serious about discipleship and transforming the culture around them? That's where I'm at. I'm tired of Christians running away like frightened sheep. Besides, Christians still have kids while everyone else spends their money on vacations and tiny houses. We'll be taking over this joint around about 2050.

It Isn't All About You

 

 

We live in a time and place overwhelmed with hyper-sensitivity to the self. Students feel micro-agressions from sidewalk chalkings, we selfie to death, and we come to church expecting the experience to revolve around us. In a time and place that changes fancies like old phone apps, this is a destructive thing. I want to suggest that the church, as a place and an institution, should be about everything but you in its space and worship.

Sacred Space is a concept that has virtually been lost in modern America as everything about the church has become utilitarian and disposable. A building that looks unique and other-worldly from the outside communicates to the world here is an embassy of another people and reassures the people of God in chaotic times, the kingdom doesn't change. An interior that arouses awe and comfort and that intuitively leads one inward among the pews and up to the place of distribution of Word and Sacrament ensures believers are reminded, without ambiguity, that God is with and among his people. Modern buildings are often confusing and thoughtless and possess a temporary feel that causes a generation scarred by divorce to wonder how long this marriage will last.

Worship has lost its sharp alien character in the 21st Century West. Strange, powerful and moving singing and liturgies have been replaced by accessible but trite elements that lead one's vision and thoughts not upward but straight in front of you. Congregational singing should be deep and special music profoundly thought-provoking in a way that lingers with you through the week. Lingering and reminding you that you've been someplace far from the space you inhabit on Monday morning. An instrument like the pipe organ, designed specifically to maximize and communicate the gigantic quality of the Kingdom of God, has been succeeded by three dudes pretending to be ballad singers from the hollers of Appalachia. Worship should pull you far away from yourself and all your self-centered desires and cast you onto a far shore filled with royal feasting halls, the songs of warriors, and sagas of conquest from the greatest empire in history.

We're rapidly coming to the end of our trajectory. The church now conveys a more flaccid narrative than our current entertainment and political culture. In order for the Church in America to survive, it must turn from "me" to "us" in the timeless, mystical sense that includes the Church Militant and Triumphant.

Tiny Houses

It seems my feed is always filled with stories about tiny houses. They're pretty nifty and I'd love to get one as a vacation home. But if you're planning on living in one you're telegraphing to the entire world that you're a quitter.

You're quitting on marriage and family. I know they're out there but every couple I read about or see on TV is unmarried. The tiny house gives them the lowest level of commitment possible. If they break up there's not going to be a huge fight over who gets to keep the tiny house. As far as family goes, who would raise kids in a tiny house parked in someones back yard? For that matter, who wants to grow up in a tiny house where everyone's business is always in your face? Tiny houses are cute, ironic versions of a Lower East Side tenement flat from 1900.

You're quitting community. Tiny houses tell everyone not to come over and you're not having anyone over. I mean, c'mon, I've seen the pictures of the couple over, with legs dangling down from the loft and the other couple standing below them sipping Chardonnay. It's the lamest, tiniest party ever. Tiny houses also telegraph to everyone you're not interested in building community. You live in a house that could suddenly disappear one night without a trace!

You're quitting on commitment. A tiny house is designed for a person who doesn't know what they want to do, where they want to live, and who they want to be. Houses are about commitment. They are typically built on slabs of concrete that say to the world, "I'm sinking down roots that I can't run away from and we're building a little kingdom here." Neighborhoods are made of houses that face out onto streets that get filled up with noisy kids, conversing wives, and husbands trying to convert garages into private lairs of Norse Meed hall awesomeness.

Oh, it's so institutional - buying a home with a mortgage and a garage. Not these days. Institutional is looking around at the world like a frightened rabbit and worrying about all the things that could go wrong. I might marry the wrong person. I might have kids I don't like and who don't like me. I might have neighbors I don't want to live next to. I might lose my job. I might be forced to regularly interact with...people.

Living in a real home means you've finally decided to be an adult.

An Open Letter to Millennial Dudes

 

To all you gents out there in the 35 and under crowd I want to say: you risk too little, you quit too easy, and you complain too much. Now that we have that out of the way, let's talk, man-to-man.

I'm a Gen X-er and I never thought I'd see the day where I'd think of my generation as hard-working and heroic - we grew up in the shadow of the Greatest Generation who were still in the workforce when we were coming of age. That day has arrived.

To begin with, we all left home after high school and never returned. New-Waver, Punk Rocker, Heavy Metal-er, it didn't matter, going home to live with mom and dad was unmanly. I left home when I was 18 and wore many hats to ensure I never went back to live in my parent's basement: janitor at a gym, door-to-door salesman, auto paint deliveryman, U.S. Marine, security guard, and sign-painter just to name a few. In case you think economic times were good and we had it made, I lived in a one room ghetto apartment with a roommate and often had bologna sandwiches and tap water for meals for weeks on end. But lots of young guys I knew back then (1980's) did the same and we knew we had it better than those before us. Fellas, you need to take risks to get greater rewards but this often means understanding you're an inexperienced schlub who deserves nothing up-front. Don't waste your money on stupid tattoos, marijuana vape, and worthless piercings.

Next, men have traditionally set courses and followed them through to the end (sometimes not good ends). Decide what you're going to do and then do it. Having a plan and following it creates its own discipline. Getting married (I did at 23) forces you to grow up and follow through. Deciding on a good degree-program or vocational course and following it through to the end makes you into a better man. You'll probably change careers numerous times but a dogged flint-like focus on not quitting and going home is what men have been doing for ages. When I was in my twenties I was determined to find good work no matter where it took me. I didn't wait around for jobs to drop into my lap from employers who would surely recognize my amazing abilities but I was willing to move to other states, even other countries, to find good work. Do difficult things that you can't quit at. To this day I look back upon my experience in the Marine Corps as a source of motivation. Being without a shower for weeks and sitting in a foxhole on night guard duty while exhausted has the tendency to put present difficulties in proper perspective.

Finally, take responsibility for who you are and where you are. Be a man. God has put you in exactly to right place and right time. When you find your decision to do a degree in Gay Film Studies isn't getting you any job interviews, change course. Don't blame it on employers, the times, or the economic system. Blame yourself and then do something about it. Some of the best decisions I've made came after frightening or depressing realizations that I was on a dead-end course.

Look around you. We live in the nicest homes in history - maybe not if you decide you have to live in a minuscule apartment in New York City or a tiny house in Seattle. We eat the best food known to mankind to the point that we can negotiate and complain about freshness or source. We have much greater opportunities than our forebears did - they had to be content with being farmers or factory workers...period.

So, take a deep breath and act like men!

Should We Sing Bar Tunes?

I’ve had uncountable numbers of people question why our church utilizes traditional Psalms and hymns in worship. The essence of their argument is that contemporary music resonates with modern people. Let’s take a look at this in more detail. BTW this is not a rail against modern music in all contexts. I was a New Waver in another life and still stay Rude in my musical selections while doing my work.

The first argument that is frequently brought up against traditional music is that it is old. After all, they say, Martin Luther used bar tunes. Hear well, this assertion about Luther is absolutely, positively false. Can we please bury that lame argument? But let’s use the substance of the argument: contemporary bar tunes (or folk tunes intended for group singing) are a good scaffold to build Christian worship music on. So, which songs shall we use? ...Anyone? Since I’m not a teetotaler, I’ve been seen in taverns on occasion and I’ve never seen anyone there singing. I am hard pressed to identify any supposed bar tunes that people today sing. Today’s music is written to be sung for entertainment not for people to sing and, if they do, they sing to themselves.

Let’s unpack this a little further. Before the advent of the phonograph, the main way people experienced music is that they sang it themselves. They sang while working, they sang while at ease, and they sang when they worshipped. Their worship music was written to be sung in concert with others. Up until 100 years ago one of the biggest forms of communal entertainment were “Singing Schools” where a professional song-leader would come to town for several weeks, teach people to sing songs (typically Psalms and hymns) in parts (Soprano, Alto, Tenor, Bass), and lead them in group singing. People used to sing in groups at events in homes - ever see those old songbooks at the music store? Sometime around the advent of the jazz age singing became something that others do to entertain you and the church has been mindlessly chasing after this practice ever since.

In the past, the church either chanted, sang vigorously in unison, or sang in parts. Musical instruments were used to accompany the human voice and the accompanying pipe organ or piano was meant to highlight the singing of the people. Modern worship music typically reverses this pattern. Note that the number of instruments and the volume of those instruments has increased. The worship band, then the worship band singers, all overarch and eclipse the congregation in its singing (though the congregation is conditioned to be observers).

For these reasons I think we should stick with tested, thoughtful, traditional music as we wait for a day when the church starts leading the musical culture again.

You Need Psalms and Hymns

I’ve been an ordained minister now for 17 years and a Christian for nearly 30. I’ve been in churches that were contemporary and sang only rocking praise choruses and I’ve been in traditional churches that only sang hymns, sometimes very poorly. One thing I can say with a great deal of certitude; you should sing Psalms and hymns.

The Psalms are God’s songbook and if you’ve read them in any depth, you soon realize they are as deep as they come and tailored to every season of life. You can’t trump the wisdom of God. Also, you won’t be one who stabs around wondering what to do when Islamic terrorists kill your brothers and sisters in the faith in the Middle East…you’ll sing imprecatory Psalms like 69.

And what of hymns? Good hymns tell full stories, have memorable tunes, and are often trinitarian. Sometimes they are warlike and others are deeply profound with words written by some of the greatest wordsmiths and saints like St. Patrick and GK Chesterton. The tunes are arranged by matchless composers like Bach and Vaughan Williams.

Someone might say, "the words are difficult and the tunes seemingly inaccessable." My answer is, and here's the takeaway, they grow you up. Learning how to sing skillfully and to be immersed in a context of deep and mature music will grow you up.

In conclusion, Psalms and Hymns will grow you, and in particular your children, up. After observing and experiencing the modern church broadly I can say that kids who are raised on a steady diet of Psalms and hymns (particularly if they're sung well and with gusto) are far more mature, reverant, and substantial young adults than those raised on contemporary praise music. How can they not be since they're being shaped by content and music that is deep?

Some Tallis

  The excellent Chamber Choir of my church, Christ Church, Santa Clarita, singing "If Ye Love me" by Thomas Tallis.

One Day in Nerima

Our house was on the last street of an Air Force Family Housing Area in the middle of Tokyo, Japan. It was the early 1970’s and the city was growing up around our little patch of America. A large field surrounded our end of the base and beyond that lay Japanese neighborhoods thick with the smell of diesel fuel and sweet grilling meats. In a ditch that separated the two worlds, someone decided to dump their massive load of old potatoes.

My brothers and I often played in that field throwing balls, flying kites and just running and running in its expanse. One day we came near the edge of it and potatoes rained down on us. I was about six years old and a group of mean older Japanese school boys, their bikes scattered about, had made the potato heap their ammo dump and headquarters. I yelled at them in Japanese to stop but they just laughed so I told them I was going to get my friend, a much older boy, and they’d be sorry. Their response was to throw more potatoes.

There really was an older boy.

I ran across the field breathlessly thinking of how sorry these “bakatares” would be when my friend strolled across the grassy frontier and taught them a lesson. I came up to his door and knocked, and knocked, and knocked. The house was dark in the late afternoon gloom and I soon realized, no one was home...what to do?

I went home, put on a beret and then pulled up the top so that it peaked up an extra few inches. I slipped into a navy overcoat and headed out the door. I strutted slowly and purposefully across the field standing as high on my toes as I could manage. About halfway across several dirty faces topped with schoolboy crew-cuts peered above the edge of the ditch a hundred yards away. Eighty yards, sixty yards, fifty yards. As I got to within forty or so yards of the potato heap I could see the other side of the ditch beyond. A half dozen boys on bicycles were riding off quickly casting back furtive looks.

Home Church = Bad Church

Not long ago, I watched one of my first episodes of "19 Kids and Counting" and I have to say, I'm not a fan. The Duggars have a lot of good things going on in their lives that I support. I think Christians should be encouraged to marry young. I think Christian couples should have a mess of kids (as many as they can afford and disciple). And I think Americans, in general, should be creative and frugal. What I don't dig is home-churching. Churches often need to start in homes (we did) but the particular type of home-churching that is basically your family and maybe a few others is actually very destructive to the church and to Christians because:

• Dad, who is not submitted to any higher authorities is the highest authority. This creates the unique, individualistic American attitude that causes Christians to boogie out of church as soon as any conflict arises or accountability comes into play. "We don't need no stinking pastors!"
• The church is a completely earthbound fleshly structure. The home-church is made up of people in one particular aspect of one relationship, family. This relationship will lose it's meaning in the age to come as the fleshly family is totally subsumed by the relationship of The Body of Christ (Mt. 22:30). Church is supposed to be a training ground for loosening our fleshly familial bonds into something greater.
• Sacraments are mediated by blood. Nearly the entire church in "19 Kids and Counting" are blood relatives. The one administering sacraments (if they even do) is their real estate agent father (I don't believe he has any ordination). What does this say about the mystery and power of the church?
• Dad is the theological authority. This isn't an isolated problem. Lots of ordained ministers these days are pretty poor theological leaders, but dad? I deal with young people every day who have headed off to college or the workplace and are thrown into oblivion by new and contrary theological ideas. Many fall into apostasy. How much of a disadvantage are you at when your whole ecclesiastical world is your siblings and your real estate agent father sitting in your living room?

I understand part of all this is practical; the Duggars are celebrities and need privacy. But when you live near a major city and can't and won't fellowship with other Christians - all those messy, sinful people IN the church, what are you saying about grace?

Pressing On

We're deep into year seven at Christ Church, the church we helped plant in 2006. We are particularized, which in Presbytery-speak means we are viable. The church is financially stable, has a full slate of church officers, and is continually growing. I could lay down some pious thoughts on church-planting but here are some brass tacks that some might find helpful:

There was a plan

Long before the church was ever launched there was a plan, a literal business plan. I know that probably rubs some people the wrong way but a business plan forces onto paper a dose of reality. Why does this community need a church like ours? What will the church look like? How much financial resources does the project need and how do we expect to obtain it? These are just some of the questions a business plan forces one to ask and execute.

There was a motivated core group

We started the church with 22 people including kids but this group was committed to hospitality and the vision of the church-plant project laid out in the business plan. We knew exactly what we were trying to do though we didn't know exactly how or when it would all come together. You can't plant a successful church without genuinely joyful and giving people who are committed to inviting people into their church, and their lives.

There was crazy faith

We had five families and $10,000 in the bank when we started. It was very tight but I was committed to serving full-time as church-planting pastor. Time is the number one factor (apart God's graciousness, of course) in starting a church. We were all convinced we were in the right place at the right time so we took a calculated risk. The extra funds needed came in, often right on time and in the exact amount needed. It was thrilling to see God answering our prayers in such a personal way.

There was discipline

We are a liturgical church so we did things in a very precise manner. We learned how to sing hymns in parts which required hiring a singing coach and it took months to get good at it. We practiced our liturgy. We prayed, we made meals and invited visitors over, we feasted and worshipped with joy. We always acted like a church that was much bigger and older than we were and then we were. The Christian life should take dedication and hard work...it's our way of life after all!

There was time

Church-planting takes time. Most church-plants fail before the five year mark. There were Sundays when there were only a dozen adults in the worship service. There were months when the offering plates were slim. There was a recession that was instrumental in causing almost half our congregation to move elsewhere for work. But you have to keep your eye on the buoy in the distance. You're not planting for next month or next year. You're planting a church that one day will be just a church and not a plant anymore.

You have to press through the disappointments, tears, frustrations, and hair-raising financial shortfalls. Church-planting is not for the faint-of-heart but it is one of the most thrilling and rewarding things a Christian can do and God loves to bless his people.

When I was born, 30% of all Americans attended mainline denominational churches. Today it is less than half that. The mainline denominations capitulated on orthodoxy long ago rejecting biblical innerancy, miracles, etc. and then began to concentrate on social revolution. First it was female ordination, which emptied the church of men, and then, overturning of the sexual order. So, where has this led?

The Presbyterian Church, USA has grown more liberal every year since their founding in 1983 and this produced the fruit of a decline of 50%. Look at this chart and notice that they have declined in membership every single year since their founding. Every single year! This is atrocious and testifies to earlier problems that were sown. Masculine leadership would never have allowed this sort of malfeasance in any organization. The only place where this happens is in overly-bureaucratized institutions where no one takes responsibility for anything.

So, having homosexual bishops who have divorced their same-sex "spouses" (like The Episcopal Church) or putting up a ballot at your General Assembly to affirm same-sex marriage is simply a sign of the hollowing out of Christian belief that occurred earlier. In the end, why would anyone want attend a Christian Church that is about as un-radical and culturally conformist as your local college LGBT support group or school PTA. The answer is they wouldn't.

Parents These Days

I've been married a long time now (to the same and only wife). I've been a parent a long time now to my brood of joyful not-so-little warriors of the cross. Parenting is something that takes common sense and the ability to listen to those who came before you. We live in a day of empty theorists and inexperienced pontificators in regards to these things.

Take this column from the Huffington Post by "Dave" (the guy who identified his son as gay at age 7 in the same publication) which gushes about how his now 9 year-old son has figured out his "type." Surprise, surprise it's dark-haired teenage boys. There are some unexamined things in this post which, in a foolish generation like ours, slip on through.

First of all, from the most accurate information we can cull, gay men make up less than 2% of the population of the U.S. This is why LGBT is so useful because it is more undefined and elastic. The best data suggests it's probably more around 1.5%. Think about that for a minute. Dave's son has about a 98.5% chance of being straight (or at least not a gay male) yet it's all been figured at age 7.

Next, dad knows his 9 year-old son's type. I don't even know my 13 year-old son's type! Dave then says this: "This has nothing to do with sex. My son is gay, but he is also 9, so he is not the "lustful cockmonster" (thank you for that turn of phrase, Chris Kluwe) that so many homophobes try to paint all gay people as." What kind of dad would even think about saying something like this in regards to their 9 year-old son on a public forum?

Homosexuals love to bring out the very tired projection/supressed homosexual comeback against anyone who disagrees with them. However, in this column someone says a lot of strangely gushy things about pretty boys with dark hair...it's Dave.

Tom Cruise Time

TYPOLOGICAL SPOILER ALERT!

This last week I watched both "Edge of Tomorrow" (I enjoyed it) and "Oblivion." Of the latter, I found it to be rich with biblical metaphors and one of the most Christian films on the market recently. Some things to look for:

• Adam and Eve
• First Adam/Last Adam
• A Garden
• Sacrificial Christ Figure
• 49 and 52 (sevens/weeks - new creation)
• A devil that destroys everything it touches
• A Simeon/John the Baptist

This list is partial and I think the super-sophisticated cynical critics can lump it. So, rent it. It's at Redbox now for a buck and a quarter which is some serious entertainment value.

Underwhelming

“Turn off the tube, it rots the mind.”

This is an old saw that I think bears much truth. Anyone who has interacted with over-stimulated people, like teenagers and college students living the dorm life, knows that an over-emphasis on sensational entertainments (loud music videos, video games, and television) doesn’t lend one to a sense of subtlety. So, why does the church do exactly this with its cool screaming youth pastors, loud bands, and big screen sanctuaries?

I’ve often lamented the shallowness of modern evangelicalism and how we bleed kids when they leave home. I believe a major reason for this is that they are overwhelmed with the sensational until it underwhelms and they are left hollowed-out shells incapable of fine discernment. Young adults incapable of discerning the fine subtleties of sacraments, biblical typology, and a well-constructed and executed liturgy (things which are fire and wind for the mature).

In the end, the entertainment driven culture of evangelicalism is endlessly sowing the seeds of its own destruction as it pumps out young adults who are unable to defend the faith with the gusto that is inculcated by a church culture that values depth and maturity.

On the Other Side of the World

Last week marked the 70th anniversary of D-Day and there were ceremonies to commemorate this momentous event. But lest anyone forget, there was another half of the war raging in the Pacific. A gritty unglamorous war without beautiful cities, picturesque villages, and even appreciative civilians. This weekend marks the 70th anniversary of the Battle of Saipan. 70,000 Marines and soldiers invaded the island on June 15, 1944 and when it was over, three weeks later, nearly 3500 Americans and 29,000 Japanese soldiers were dead. Another 22,000 civilians had committed suicide. As with most battles in the Pacific, only a handful of Japanese surrendered. It was a war of annihilation.

The battle saw peculiar events including the "million dollar wound" that sent PFC Lee Marvin home and formed the actor-to-be. It also witnessed a terrifically horrendous event, the largest banzai charge of WWII. At dawn on July 7, 1944, the last able-bodied men of the Japanese garrison (some 3000 men) formed up behind a group of 12 men carrying a gigantic red flag. Behind them came some 1500 wounded men, barely armed, some on crutches. They hurled themselves at two battalions of US troops nearly wiping them out in a furious 15 hour fight. When it was over nearly all the Japanese were dead. As a measure of the tenacity of the struggle, Captain Oba and a group of 200 Japanese continued to fight until 3 months after WWII had ended.

Let us not forget the "Old Breed."