UNDERSTANDING THE UPSTREAM VISION, Part 1

 Part 1

 The best way for me to explain to you the Upstream Vision is to tell you a story. A man was walking through the bush with his dog enjoying the outdoors, the fragrances of nature, the warmth of the sun’s rays, the chirping of the birds, the sounds of the flowing river, and — suddenly he heard the panicked cries for help coming from the river. He ran to the riverbank and saw a hapless victim being swept downstream. He threw himself into raging river and eventually managed to rescue the drowning man further downstream. The next day this bushwalker’s heroism was featured on the front-page of the local newspaper. That day, he and his dog attempted to complete their previous day’s interrupted walk — but it was interrupted again by the cries for help from yet another drowning person being swept downstream! In fact, for the next five days the same dog-walking bushwalker vainly tried to complete his walk but was kept busy rescuing drowning people being swept downstream! Recognising the growing crisis, the municipal councillors met and decided to apply for a government grant to be able to station a full-time lifeguard on the riverbank. After the lifeguard was hired, he too was kept busy rescuing people being swept downstream. The council then applied for further federal funding as the lifeguard was barely able to keep up with the numbers of rescued victims now requiring to be driven into town to be hospitalised. The council received their funding to build a permanent ambulance station next to the lifeguard station. Soon there were multiple full-time lifeguards and ambulance drivers working around the clock to rescue and hospitalise victims.The council then needed to employ a CEO to manage the worksite and the CEO, of course, needed an executive assistant who needed a personal assistant who needed an admin’ assistant to help oversee the busy operation. Then the predictable happens! There was a government funding cut-back and the council decide that they could no longer afford the lifeguards, the ambulance drivers, admin’ assistants, or the personal assistant, but decided to keep the CEO and his executive assistant.

Around this time, the dog-walking bushwalker decided one more time to complete his walk through the bush track. As he went deeper into the bush going upstream and alongside the river, he walked over the foot bridge spanning the river and noticed that there were two $2 planks of timber missing in the foot bridge through which everyone had been falling into river!

¶ “You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people’s feet … In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.
Matthew 5:13, 16

And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
Matthew 28:18-20

The Christian Church has had a long tradition of working ‘downstream’ in and amongst society’s deepest and darkest problems. In fact, Christianity itself was birthed in one of the darkest hours in human history. Dr. F.W. Boreham has noted that at the darkest points in human history when all hope seemed lost, it was often the case that God’s response to such bleak times was to send a baby into the world. The greatest example of this customary divine response was the birth of Mankind’s eternal Saviour, Jesus the Christ.

¶ But when the right time came, God sent His Son, born of a woman, subject to the law. God sent Him to buy freedom for us who were slaves to the law, so that He could adopt us as His very own children.
Galatians 4:4-5 NLT

 Consider the unlikely geo-political-cultural backdrop at the time of Christ’s incarnation. 

• It was a time of widespread political corruption at every level of government and administration.

• It was a time of rampant sexual abuse of women and children.

• It was a time of economic suppression of the poor.

• It was a time of educational deprivation reducing in ignorance and illiteracy which placed the uneducated in a vulnerable state of manipulation.

• It was a time of widespread fictional religious ideas that played on this widespread ignorance.

When He saw the crowds, He had compassion for them,
because they were harassed and helpless,
like sheep without a shepherd.
Matthew 9:36

But then…

 When the Christ came, and Christianity was birthed –

• The place of women was elevated (women were the first witnesses to, and proclaimers of, Christ’s resurrection for example)

• The position of slaves was redeemed (Gal. 3:28)

• The practice of baby exposure (were unwanted babies were left out at night in forests or the market square to be ravaged by wild animals) was countered by Christians actively rescuing these abandoned babies (most of whom were girls)

• Churches were planted around the Empire which became centres of learning which countered the pervasive errors and false ideas widely accepted by the masses (1Pet. 1:14).

•  Lepers were  cared for and their wounds tended to.

• When plagues came, Christians were at the forefront of caring for and nursing the sick and dying (“During plague periods in the Roman Empire, Christians made a name for themselves. Historians have suggested that the terrible Antonine Plague of the 2nd century, which might have killed off a quarter of the Roman Empire, led to the spread of Christianity, as Christians cared for the sick and offered a spiritual model whereby plagues were not the work of angry and capricious deities but the product of a broken Creation in revolt against a loving God.” [SOURCE]). Christians became known as “those who ran into the plague—not from it!” 

• Over the centuries, Christians pioneered and established public hospitals, public schools, and universities.

• Missionaries were sent to the far-flung parts of the world bringing ‘social lift’ wherever they went.

• Grounded in the emerging Christian worldview, modern science was birthed and promoted by: Galileo, Copernicus, Isaac Newton, Louis Pasteur, Johannes Kepler, Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit, Anders Celsius, Sir William Thomson (Lord Kelvin), Edwin Hubble, and Hugh Ross.

Sir Isaac Newton (1643-1727)

“This most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets, could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful Being….All variety of created objects which represent order and life in the universe could happen only by the willful reasoning of its original Creator, whom I call the ‘Lord God’….He is eternal and infinite, omnipotent and omniscient; that is, His duration reaches from eternity to eternity; His presence from infinity to infinity; He governs all things, and knows all things that are or can be done. I have a fundamental belief in the Bible as the Word of God, written by those who were inspired. I study the Bible daily.”

-Sir. Isaac Newton

But then…

 In AD 312 a new trajectory was also seeded into Christianity. This eventually led to the message of the saving gospel being subjugated by the lure of political power. Over the ensuing centuries, many of those who rose to high leadership positions within the Church, whose Christianity was quite questionable, used their ecclesiastical (“Church”) position to further their own interests not the interests of Christ or others. In many respects, the expression “Dark Ages” refers to this superficial period of Christian leadership who were more interested in political power rather than spiritual purity. History tells us that wherever the light that God had ordained to shine through His people ceased, there has been a void and a darkness that the enemy has been too keen to fill. In the late 600s and into the early 700s, when the Dark Ages were nearing their darkest, a new religion challenged Christianity—but not merely with strange ideas, but with the edge of the sword. Church leaders responded, proving their ignorance of the Scriptures, recruiting mercenary soldiers to fight in the crusades. This merger of Church and State led to what became known as Christendom and became not just a political force, but by the Medieval period it had also become a military force as well.

Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first. If not, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place, unless you repent.
Revelation 2:5

 

But then…

John Wycliffe (ca. 1328 – 1384)

 In AD 1328 God introduced a baby into the world by the name John Wycliffe. His arrival marked the early days of what would later become known as the Enlightenment Period and The Reformation. The Dark Ages would be soon be over because John Wycliffe would take the ancient manuscript copies of the New Testament in their original language and translate them into the language spoken by common Englishmen of his day. The Holy Spirit then sent William Tyndale, another Englishman, to build on the work of Wycliffe. He translated the whole Bible into English and paid for it with his life. As more and more people were able to read or hear the Bible in their own language the more they realised that what the Church was teaching did not accord with the Bible. Added to these flames of revival, in Italy the gospel according to the Bible was being preached by Girolamo Savonarola, in Switzerland by Huldrych Zwingli, by the great Czech preacher John Hus in Bohemia, in Germany by Martin Luther, and in Geneva by John Calvin. These flames of revival were fanned by the Holy Spirit into the 1700s with the great preaching ministries of John Wesley and George Whitefield who both saw tens of thousands of people come to Christ and led to William Wilberforce the English Parliamentarian become the patron of around 70 societies which included the abolition of slavery, the establishment of the Bible Society, the formation of the Royal Society for the Protection of Cruelty against Animals (RSPCA), prison reform (including the principle of Habeas Corpus), and the establishment of free public schools.

A young Billy Graham preaching to a huge crowd, 1947

In the 1800s when the light of the Enlightenment finally enabled people to see that scientific facts should not be disregarded merely because the Church had claimed the Bible said so, more and more people began to openly challenge the claims of the Bible. This was especially so from November 24th, 1859, when Charles Darwin published, Origin of The Species. This helped to fuel a movement in Tübingen among German theologians known as Liberalism which denied nearly all of the supernatural claims of the Bible including the virgin birth of Christ, His miracles, and His resurrection. Liberalism attempted to reduce the purpose of Christianity merely to achieving the newly coined term, social justice (largely caring for the poor and the downtrodden). But by the late 19th century and early in the 20th century a fresh move of the Holy Spirit began to reignite the Christians around the world to return to accepting the supernatural aspects of the Bible as true. The Holy Spirit raised up many great preachers who built extraordinarily large congregations and experienced phenomenal miracles in the process. A new breed of evangelists around the world helped to strengthen this new move of God with thousands being converted to Christ all around the world. In particular, a young dairy farmer from just outside Charlotte, North Carolina, Billy Graham, would end up preaching to around 2.2 billion people throughout his evangelistic meetings, with 3.3 million people coming to know Christ as their Saviour! Billy Graham is largely credited with creating the term Evangelicalism. The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association has continued to be focused on evangelism and has grown into one of the world’s most respected rapid response relief agencies. 

[NEXT:  Part 2 – How the Holy Spirit is inspiring a new generation of “Upstream” Christians to develop strategies for solving the world’s greatest and darkest problems in a neighbourhood near you!]  

Your pastor,

Andrew

Let me know what you think below in the comment section and feel free to share this someone who might benefit from this Pastor’s Desk.

MAN UP!

MAN UP!

When I was growing up there were a lot movies in cinemas and on TV about rugged cowboys—and even commercials being made that featured other rugged cowboys. Men were presented as manly. Then along came James Bond, who knew how to fly any plane, pilot a car that could be driven off a pier into the sea as his Lotus that turned doubled as a submarine, and ski down the blackest run in the world and parachute (with a Union Jack) off a 5,000 foot cliff back into civilisation in a tuxedo. And, of course, time prevents me from talking about the super-heroes like Superman, Spiderman, and Batman, who lived secretly with their true identities while saving the world each weekday afternoon in under 30 minutes (including commercials). But over time, I came to be a little disturbed with Hollywood’s presentation of what it meant to be a man because each of these men lacked the essential qualities for what it truly means to be a man.

“I am about to go the way of all the earth. Be strong, and show yourself a man!“
(The dying King David to his young son, and heir to his throne, Solomon) First Kings 2:2

ESSENTIAL MANHOOD

We are now on the verge of a theological tsunami. A generation is now growing up where the concepts of manhood, husband and father — each Biblical metaphors for God — have been distorted. This might well be the biggest challenge the Church has ever faced in its 2,000 years of existence! And I want us to be a part of the prevention and solution!

While my growing up years were characterised by these rather rugged, solitary, hero-type, men, I must confess that I found something quite charming and even endearing about The Brady Bunch. There was something quite appealing to me about three girls who had lost their dad, and three boys who had lost their mum, have their losses mutually covered by their surviving parents getting married. I found the solution that Mr Brady provided for these three girls and their mum to be a beautiful and very noble idea. It inspired me to also want to have six children of my own when I grew up! Perhaps this is one of the reasons why I took careful note of those parents who stood out to me as a great parents. Even though, at about the age of 6, I hadn’t factored in the necessity of this plan involving one day getting married, I overlooked this gap in my plan and watched how great parents went about fulfilling their roles. What I observed dramatically altered my concept of what it meant to be a man. My new revelation of what essential manhood involved caused me to feel quite inadequate. And this was a problem for me, because as a teenager I could not deny the growing sense of God’s call on my life to be a pastor. But how could ever become a pastor if I was so inadequate? I was so concerned about this, I spoke with my church’s youth group leader, David ( ) Outhred, about what my options were considering my inadequacies. He essentially told me to “Man up!“

¶ “The saying is trustworthy: If anyone aspires to the office of overseer, he desires a noble task. Therefore an overseer must be above reproach, the husband of one wife”
First Timothy 3:1-2a

BEING A MAN

The parents that I observed who were doing a great job with their kids all had two things in common. Firstly, they parented as a team. Their relationship with each other was the strength of their parenting. They genuinely loved each other. Secondly, they parented intentionally which involved them willingly making certain sacrifices in order to be parents. They genuinely loved their children, but this never meant that their kids were the centre of their lives—God was! They taught their kids, by using a parent’s best friend ~ consistency ~ that when they said “No” they didn’t mean, “If you keep asking I’ll say yes just to shut you up.” Their love for their kids was unconditional, even though their saying “No” at times brought defiance and childish accusations of unfairness. This requires tireless courage on the part of mum and dad. Too often though, I noticed that some dads didn’t work as a team with their soul-mate. It was if they saw raising children as the woman’s job(?). Additionally, some men were easily broken down by their children’s defiance, and became very inconsistent with their parenting. Perhaps without realising it, these dads were undermining the efforts of their wives to teach their children some of life’s most essential and necessary lessons!

Solo-parenting presents a whole other set of difficulties. If you ever get to talk to a single parent and their challenges in parenting, and I’ve talked with many about this, they will tell you that they have twice the workload with half the resources to accomplish it. Single parenting is a tough gig. But so is parenting as a couple! Especially when the man is not playing his part. And too many women, not all of course, are left to become solo-parents because the father of their child/ren has abducted or fled his responsibilities.

Being a dad demands that a man becomes a different man in order to be a husband and a dad. All too often this is too big of a hill for many men to climb, and they run and hide (into their work, into their shed, or into their fishing gear) to avoid the climb. Little wonder then that Hollywood (largely comprised of male film producers!) depicts manly men as playboys with little responsibilities to “tie them down”, and married men—who are fathers—as buffoons! (An example below:)

THE ULTIMATE MAN

So Jesus came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. Pilate said to them, “Behold the man!”
John 19:5

Consider Jesus (Heb. 3:1). Consider this man, who Pilate presented to Israel as the man (Jn. 19:5).

• He gladly spent time with children (Matt. 18:2-5; watch)
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• He protected vulnerable and at-risk women (John 8:10-11)
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• He endorsed and gave support to parents (Lk. 8:41-42)
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• He honoured marriage between a man and a woman (John 2:1-11; watch; Matt. 19:4-6)
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Consider also how Jesus presented a radical view of God. While Israel had had a concept of Yahweh (God) as their Father (Isaiah 63:16), it was not until Jesus that anyone thought of Yahweh as my Father. In what must have sounded like a shocking way to speak of Yahweh, Jesus used a very intimate Aramaic word for father when speaking of God – Abba (Mk 13:36). The epistle writers regarded this Aramaic word for God The Father as so precious, they often transliterated it directly into Greek rather than using the Greek word (‘pater’). 

For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by Whom we cry, “Abba! Father!”
Romans 8:15

And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!”
Galatians 4:6

This Aramaic word, Abba, is best translated into English as ‘Daddy‘ or ‘Daddy dear‘. It is an incredibly affectionate term of endearment. This is how the disciples heard Jesus pray to His Father.

THREE THINGS MEN CAN LEARN FROM THE ULTIMATE MAN

When it comes to saving the world, Jesus was greater than any made-up super-hero. When comes to fulfilling a mission, Jesus was greater than fictional British playboy spy. Jesus was also the greatest lover of women ever — and yet, He never had sex. Jesus was the strongest, smartest, wisest, most ethical, sinless, purest, courageous, virtuous, determined, man ever. He didn’t see children as nuisances. He didn’t treat women as objects. He didn’t use vicious humour to belittle. He protected the weak. He looked after the poor. He ate with the marginalised. He assisted foreigners. He blessed struggling small-business operators. He gave of Himself to soldiers who were oppressors and invaders of his nation. There is much for men to emulate from the example of Jesus The Christ. Here’s three things every man, who will one day be—or is—a husband and father:

1. Love your wife. Treat her with unfair kindness (grace). Christ does for His (Ephesians 5:25). Get to know her. Find out what her favourites are. Discover what all of her likes and dislikes are. Learn how to apologise to her. Date her regularly. Notice her (be particularly alert to new hairstyles!). Write her a love poem – at least once a year (see Mick Dadson for tips on how to do this). Listen to her point of view and prove to her that you understand it. Remember, the strength of relationship with her determines the strength of your parenting and the level of security that your children will enjoy.
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2. Play with your kids. Teach your children what true and real love is. Teach your children the stories of the Bible. Teach your children who God is and what He is like. And play with your children. Let them see and experience how man who is much bigger, much stronger, and much smarter than them, can restrain each of these attributes to help them to enjoy their time with dad and have happy memories of their children where they laughed a lot (Ephesians 6:4). Remember that your holidays together are going to be some of the fondest memories your children will ever have. Start saving now for your next family holiday.
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3. Don’t make your wife or your kids the centre of your life – it will ruin them. When someone lives with anyone other than God as the centre of their life, the calls this idolatry (1Cor. 10:14). The centre of Christ’s world was His Abba, not His disciples, and not even His Church. But because of His love for His Father, He could love His disciples, His followers, and those He interacted with even though some of them were considered His enemies. Your love for God as a husband and a father strengthens your number one mission in life for your wife and children: to help bring them closer to God. This is why things like family devotions, or dinner time prayers, or bedside Bible stories, are so important for fathers who love their children. It is also why attending church as a family is critically important because it helps to keep God as the Centre of our lives. 
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THE THEOLOGICAL TSUNAMI

The reason I state this this is potentially a theological tsunami that will make our mission even more difficult, is that our presentation of God is the one that Christ gave us to deliver to the world – that God is our Heavenly Father, our Abba. Because of the perception that many of this generation are getting of what a man and father is, there ability to know God as their Heavenly Father is impeded. For those of us who know God as our Abba, we know that there are times when He says “No” to our prayer requests. Good, loving, kind, fathers must, at times, say “No” to their children. But a generation that has been drawn into the devil’s sticky web of deception and beguiled into the lie that are entitled to have whatever they want — in fact, they have a right to whatever they want, are going to struggle with a God who says “No” but still unconditionally loves them. Unless, of course, we provide them of counter-examples of loving, kind, considerate, generous, manhood and fatherhood that reflects who God the Father really is. If we can do that, at least in our island state, we might just have a chance of staving off this looming theologically incorrect tsunami.

 Pastor Andrew.