Book Review of Peter Bergen's 'The United States of Jihad'

I am extremely grateful for the detailed treatment Peter Bergen gives to America’s so-called ‘war on terror’ in his book ‘The United States of Jihad.’  He paints a picture of a problem that on one hand is too elusive for the massive forces of law enforcement in the United States, but on the other hand is unlikely to directly affect the daily lives of most Americans.  He points out that people are 12,000 times more likely to die in a car accident than in a terrorist attack (p. 272).  However, we don’t live in fear of driving our cars around.  We get in our cars and go without thinking about it.

The stories of the different terrorist attacks in the United States are compelling.  The deaths are tragic.  So too is the fact that it will likely happen again and the media will jump on the next event and over-cover it just it has the previous ones.  The ‘terror’ produced by these incidents is disproportionate to the damage they cause.  The tragedy is innocent people do die.  Furthermore, the families of those who become terrorists also suffer deeply.  And law enforcement suffers embarrassment.  Bergen points out of that many of the attacks were carried out by people the FBI had looked at and dismissed as unlikely to commit terrorist acts. 

My conclusion, having read Bergen’s book is that evil has always been a part of the human story and will continue to be.  In the past evil went by names like slavery, institutionalized racism, genocide, and Jim Crow.  Today, evil is named radicalization, Islamophobia, Jihad (that leads to murderous acts), and terrorism.  Of course evil has many other names today, but these are a few of the more high profile ones. This age of terror will pass.  And evil will find new names.  But evil does not win unless we let it.

Book Review - Objective Troy

Scott Shane’s ‘Objective Troy’ is a much needed book.  Anyone who cares about America’s place in current worldwide affairs should read it.  Shane educated me about the nation of Yemen and the history of the United States’ so called war on terror.  

            Shane’s research is exceedingly thorough, his writing style flows nicely, and his conclusions are fair and based on facts.  He offers opinions, but he does so from a reasonable starting point.  This means his work is quite easy to read, makes a lot of sense, and is persuasive.

            That last observation, the persuasiveness of Shane’s work, for me is challenging. I have very much wanted to like our current president, Barak Obama.  And in some ways, I still do.  However, Shane reveals a side of Obama – the side that prefers secrecy to transparency –I find disappointing.  I believe what Shane shows is accurate.  In the ‘war on terror,’ Obama’s hands are dirty, and I am not sure the messes were handled in the best way.

            So, I recommend ‘Objective Troy.’  In fact, for anyone who wants to get a grasp of American history 2000-2015, I’d say it a must read.  

I was given a free copy of this book for the purpose of writing a review.

Orlando Shootings, LGBT, Islamaphobia, Gun Control

          Omar Mateen carried an assault rifle and a pistol into the Pulse club, a gay night club in Orlando Florida.  He killed 49 people.  It was Sunday morning, June 12, 2AM.  I woke for church on Sunday around 6:30.  My son was watching the news around 8AM.  The weather was on.  After the weather, we turned off the TV and began getting ready for church.  I had no knowledge of the shooting. 

          At church, no one mentioned it to me and I did not look at any news outlets.  So, as the service began and then throughout the service, I had no knowledge that the worst mass shooting in U.S. history had happened a few short hours earlier.  During our prayer time, I did not know.  No one mentioned it to me.

          After the worship service, our family ate lunch at home, with no media on.  Then, my middle son and I got in the car for the 3-hour drive to my parents’ place in Roanoke.  We listened to a Hardy Boys mystery on CD the entire way.  Upon arrival, we hung out with my parents, played games, shot baskets on their backyard hoop, and ate.  Finally, around 8:30PM, I was flipping channels and stopped at CNN.  Over 16 hours after the shooting, I finally found out.  If I had known Sunday morning, we would have had a time of prayer in our worship service.

          For what would we pray?  Of course, we’d pray for the family members and friends of the victims. We would ask God to provide solace and comfort.  We would pray for the more than 50 people who were injured but not killed.  We would pray that God would heal their wounds and soothe their shattered psyches.  And we’d pray for the survivors.  They may be alive and uninjured, but they are not unscathed.  We would pray for them as they carry the burden of survivor’s guilt and the horrors of watching their friends die.  The images they see when they close their eyes to sleep will haunt them in their dreams for a long time. 

Yes, there is much to pray for and we carry all of it to God on behalf of these wounded people.  What else?

We must pray for the family of the shooter, Omar Mateen.  They will be ostracized.  American society as a whole feels the shock and the anger of such an event.  Unstable persons could escalate the violence if in a misguided attempt at justice they were to lash out at Mateen’s relatives.  These people will carry shame and will need God’s help to be free. 

What else?  What do else do we say when we pray?  An interesting thing about this story is the convergence of many different political hot potatoes.  There is homophobia, the hatred of the LGBT community.  There is Islamophobia, the hatred of all things Muslim.  That fact that the killer was Muslim and self-identified as an ISIS supporter arms Islamophobs with all they need to demonize the entire religion and all who practice it. 

Then, there is the issue of gun control.  Those who abhor the accessibility of military style assault weapons will have a field day attacking, ideologically, those who defend their 2^nd amendment right to “keep and bear” arms. 

This story has created strange bed fellows.  I read and posted an opinion from a conservative Christian who wants to damn all Muslims and to liken the religion to the circumstances in 1920’s Germany that set the table of the rise of fascism and Nazism.  The Orlando shootings show that if we don’t stop ISIS now, it will become another Hitler-led Nazi type of power that wreaks havoc and propagates genocide. Many of my Facebook friends pointed out several leaps of logic that in the article.  What I found fascinating in it is that the author, a conservative, linked arms with high profile atheists Bill Maher, Richard Dawkins, and Ayn Hirsi Ali in order to brand Islam as violent and evil.  And he did this in defense of the victims, gay people.  Recall the last time you remember conservative Christians aligning with Atheists to defend gays from Muslims.  I bet you cannot think of time.  I can’t. 

The enemy of my enemy is my friend?

For the record, I know all Muslims are not violent because I spend a week in a community that is 70% Muslim.  While I am there, I talk about Jesus and try to convince people to follow him.  The Muslims react in violent ways. They sell me bread and fruit.  They welcome me into their homes and heap hospitality on me.  And at the hotel bar, they sell me beer and soda.  Smiling the entire time.  I have never felt safer anywhere.

For the record, I do not keep weapons in my home.  Yet, I am good friends with card-carrying NRA members.  I don’t think the issue is as simple as some of my dogmatic anti-gun friends.  But, I do believe it would be helpful to significantly reduce the number of assault weapons and automatic, high volume, rapid fire guns.  Nobody needs those.  You don’t need an arsenal that Rambo would envy to protect your home.  And having a gun doesn’t make you safer.  The guard at the Pulse night club was armed, but 50 people still died.

For the record, I love gay and lesbian people.  Not all of them.  I don’t know all of them.  But, I love the ones I know.  My neighbors.  Old friends who now take care of my nephews and nieces.  Dear friends who are still “in the closet.”  Based on my reading of Matthew 19:1-12 and Romans 1:18-32, I do not believe same sex marriage is God-honoring or sanctified by God.  I believe homosexuality is outside God’s plan for human sexuality.  But I want you to pay attention to something.  I wrote my theology after identifying how many gay and lesbian people I love. 

And please notice this.  I don’t count homosexual sex as an unforgivable sin.  Some Christians don’t think it is a sin at all.  If they and I are to discuss the divergence in our theology, I’d like to do it in an atmosphere of friendship and love.  And I do believe that someone can hold the opinion that same sex marriage is OK in God’s eyes and at the same time that person can be a disciple.  To put it simply, in theological terms, I oppose same sex marriage.  But I don’t think someone is disqualified from the title ‘Christian’ just because they disagree with me on this point. 

So where are we?  I think the way of Christ is the way of compassion.  His encounter with the rich young ruler is an example.  He was working to correct this man’s understanding by helping the man shift his priorities from a dependence on material wealth to a dependence on faith in God.  But, Jesus knew the man would not respond, not the way Jesus preferred.  Still, the Gospel say that when Jesus told him to part with his riches, before Jesus said a word, he looked at him and “loved him” (Mark 10:21).  That’s where we are.  We are to love people.

We – followers of Jesus – are to be peddlers of the Gospel.  When it comes to social issues, we start from the cross and resurrection and base ourselves there.  If we find ourselves in disagreement with someone on any of the issues I have raised, we enter the conversation compassionately seeking to love the other even in disagreement.  Most importantly, we do not settle for the prevailing narrative. We loudly but compassionately proclaim a counter narrative, one in which the love of Jesus rules the day.  That story must be told and lived, and we must be the ones to tell it and live it.

I close with a tweet from Russell Moore:

 Following

Russell MooreVerified account‏@drmoore

Christian, your gay or lesbian neighbor is probably really scared right now. Whatever our genuine disagreements, let's love and pray

"Who's Got Your Ear" (1 Kings 12:1-11)

July 12, 2015

          Alex, a 23-year-old Sunday school teacher and babysitter, was trembling with excitement the day she told her Twitter followers that she had converted to Islam.[i]

          That is how the New York Times story begins.  It ends with her secretly logging on to Skype to receive this message from Faisal, a man she had never met in person.

          I told [your grandmother] I would never communicate with you again.  But I lied.

          Between that opening and closing we get to know Alex, an isolated young woman in a rural community in the state of Washington.  She lived an isolated, lonely life, sharing a home with her grandparents.  Mabin Shaikh said this is exactly the type of person recruiters seek out online. 

          Mr. Shaikh was himself a member of an extremist Islamic group.  After leaving that group he went on to testify before the United State congress about the mechanics of radicalization.  He said of extremist recruiters, “We look for people who are isolated.”

          They can pick up on someone’s loneliness by following their twitter account, trolling them on Skype, and paying attention to their Facebook “likes,” their posts, and their comments in chatrooms and forums.  Mr. Shaikh identified this method of seeking out those Americans who lived isolated lives.  He said, “If they are not isolated already, then we isolate them.”

          Illustrating this point, Faisal, the man who reached out to Alex, surprised her when she told him she had convert to Islam.  She excitedly told home she had found a Mosque near her home.  His tone went cold.  He told her to stay away from the Mosque.  She did not know any Muslims, not in person anyway.  He warned, Muslims in the United States are persecuted and she would be branded a terrorist.  She should keep her new identity a secret and live a double life.    She complied.

          By the way, he lied.  I recently attended a dinner Muslims have to break the fast during Ramadan.  It was an invitation to Christians to come and see what non-radicalized Islam is about.  It was a lovely time where they offered us generous hospitality.  I do not think Islam and Christianity are compatible, but we can be friends.  We can show generosity to one another.  I was treated with great respect by these Muslims and everything about the evening was transparent.  Faisal did not want Alex to discover this peaceful, open version of Islam that does exist in American and other places.  She listened to Faisal. 

          So, if she could not associate with other Muslims or go to the Mosque, how could she (a) become a Muslim and (b) grow in her faith?  He told her to become Muslim, in the presence of witnesses she needed to repeat the phrase, “There is no God but Allah and Muhammad is his messenger.”  So she tweeted the phrase, and Faisal acted as her witness along with another Twitter follower, one of Faisal’s associates, Hallie Sheikh.

          Within hours, her number of followers on Twitter doubled.  That night she tweeted, “I actually have brothers and sisters.  I am crying.”  Of course these ‘brothers and sisters’ were names and twitter accounts, not people Alex ever met or touched or looked in the eye. 

At some point, she suspected Faisal may not be telling her everything.  She looked him up online to discover that he had twice been arrested in England for possession of massive amounts of illegal firearms and explosives.  He was in his 50’s, married, and had children – he had not shared any of this with her. 

          Moreover, her grandmother discovered the secret life she led online.  She, called the FBI who came to the house and downloaded her entire electronic communication history.  Alex handed over control of all her online accounts to her grandparents who shut them all down.  But they forgot to close the Skype account.  On family vacation, while her grandparents were out on the beach, she logged on and Faisal contacted her immediately. 

          Why is this story important?  To whom are we listening?  Fox News?  NPR?  A preacher on TV? What angle is the person to whom you listen closely taking?  What is that person trying to get you to do?

Consider Rehoboam, the king who followed Solomon.  His story is found in Second Kings chapter 12.  Solomon’s reign was Israel’s Golden Age.  Nations around the world admired the greatness of Solomon and Israel under Solomon.  But, he also had his own failings, most specifically, adultery which led him into unfaithfulness to God.  He died and his son Rehoboam took over. 

As soon as his took the throne, he inherited the pressures of leadership and it came in the form of complaints that Solomon had been too tough on the 10 Northern tribes.  Led by Jereboam this is how the exchange went.

Jeroboam and all the assembly of Israel came and said to Rehoboam, ⁴ “Your father made our yoke heavy. Now therefore lighten the hard service of your father and his heavy yoke that he placed on us, and we will serve you.” ⁵ He said to them, “Go away for three days, then come again to me.” So the people went away.

⁶ Then King Rehoboam took counsel with the older men who had attended his father Solomon while he was still alive, saying, “How do you advise me to answer this people?” ⁷ They answered him, “If you will be a servant to this people today and serve them, and speak good words to them when you answer them, then they will be your servants forever.” ⁸ But he disregarded the advice that the older men gave him, and consulted with the young men who had grown up with him and now attended him. ⁹ He said to them, “What do you advise that we answer this people who have said to me, ‘Lighten the yoke that your father put on us’?” ¹⁰ The young men who had grown up with him said to him, “Thus you should say to this people who spoke to you, ‘Your father made our yoke heavy, but you must lighten it for us’; thus you should say to them, ‘My little finger is thicker than my father’s loins. ¹¹ Now, whereas my father laid on you a heavy yoke, I will add to your yoke. My father disciplined you with whips, but I will discipline you with scorpions.’”

King Rehoboam listened to the advice of men with no more experience that himself.  If he did what they recommended and ruled with an iron fist, it might make him and his court wealthy, but it would continue to weaken and emasculate the rest of the country.  The people whom he counted on for support would come to hate him.  But those advisors around him told him what he wanted to hear.

To whom are we listening?  Who has my ear or yours?  Are they telling us things we want to hear?  If we follow their advice will it greatly benefit them?  Are they leading us down a path that will needlessly create enmity as we help them and maybe ourselves but hurt others?

Alex, the 23-year-old recruit into radical Islam, was told to hide her new life from the people she had always lived with, her family. 

To whom are we listening?  Are they telling us to keep secrets?  Are they telling us to pretend to be one thing?  Are they turning us against our own family?  Are they secretive about who they are? 

If your family or your circle of friend is into hard core drug use or pornography, separate from them.  Don’t stop loving them but remove yourself from their influence because the things they are into are destructive and deadly.

But if someone from a religious group or a new circle of friends or a new life philosophy is actively paying attention to you in order to get you to follow the path they walk, ask why?  Why do they want you to keep things secret from your parents or your spouse or your friends?  Why do they get uncomfortable when you ask “why?”

I encourage you to question everything I teach.  Hold the words I share up to scripture.  Talk to trusted friends in our church or people you trust outside out community. 

We have no secrets.  We believe Jesus is Lord, salvation is found in Him, and the way to joy and eternal life is through Him, his cross and resurrection. We believe all people need him.  We say this openly and we try to be transparent in our presentation of the Gospel.  We want all people to become passionately devoted followers of Jesus.  Tell everyone you know that this is what we are about. 

And test everyone who tries to influence you. 

That’s the bottom line this morning.  Identify the most powerful influences in your life.  It could be a parent, a TV personality, an author, a friend, a pastor, a spouse, a sibling, or a boss or role model.  Take a moment, step outside yourself, and identify to whom you listen.  Who is it you respect the most?

Now critically assess what that person is sharing with you.  I know you aren’t necessarily like Alex whose feelings of isolation made her vulnerable.  But you and I – we have other vulnerabilities.  We have blind spots and in those blind spots, the enemy, the devil, will draw us away from our devotion and loyalty to Christ.  We will find ourselves led down a path we never imagined we’d travel, a path rife with snares. 

How do we guard against being deceived?  First, look to Solomon.  Early in his reign as king, the Lord spoke to him and offered him anything he might desire.  He said to God,

“⁹ Give your servant therefore an understanding mind to govern your people, able to discern between good and evil; for who can govern this your great people?”

¹⁰ It pleased the Lord that Solomon had asked this. ¹¹ God said to him, “Because you have asked this, and have not asked for yourself long life or riches, or for the life of your enemies, but have asked for yourself understanding to discern what is right, ¹² I now do according to your word. Indeed I give you a wise and discerning mind.” 

Ask God for wisdom, as Solomon did. 

Second, pay attention to advisors who are looking out for your best interests and are pointing you to Christ.  First John chapter 4 begins this way:

Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God; for many false prophets have gone out into the world. ² By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, ³ and every spirit that does not confess Jesus^[a^]is not from God. And this is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming; and now it is already in the world. ⁴ Little children, you are from God, and have conquered them; for the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. 

Finally, seek God in prayer.  Hebrews 4:16 says we can “approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”  We are invited to bring all our concerns into God’s presence.  Why would we ever not take advantage of such a generous divine invitation?

I pray God will rescue Alex from the allure of the seductions that have latched onto her.  And I pray you and I can live in wisdom and share the truth of the Gospel as we live our lives.

AMEN

---

[i] R. Callimachi, The New York Times, June 28, 2015, p.A1.

Review of the Underground Girls of Kabul

            I know that the situation in Afghanistan is not the norm for all women in the Muslim faith.  I know that there are situations in some Christian communities where women lack equality with men, access to education, and opportunities to reach their potential.  I say this because I don’t want to overstate the case.  However, I find Jenny Nordberg’s book about women in Kabul and throughout Afghanistan to be credible.

            Because it is believable, it is hard to accept.  Women in Afghanistan have no rights.  Even the individual Nordberg gives the most attention to, the politician is under heel in her own home.  Jenny Nordberg has opened a world that most Americans and westerners never see or understand.  Now that she has revealed it, I still don’t understand it.

            I come away from my reading of “The Underground Girls of Kabul” thinking there is no way in traditional Islam that women can ever be fully human.  Combined with the experiences shared in Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s “Infidel,” I am left to conclude that a main thread of Islam involves the violent subjugation of women. 

            I am a Baptist pastor who tries to afford women every opportunity men have within the church.  My more conservative Baptist peers do not feel women should be allowed to be ordained as pastors.  I do.  However, even the conservative Baptists in the United States have no objection to women becoming doctors, lawyers, politicians, or university professors.  The rights denied women in conservative American Christianity while wrong pale in comparison to the way women are subjugated in normative Islamic life in Afghanistan.

            I think Jenny Nordberg went through real hardship to research this book and her final product is a gift to any thinking person who wants to understand the situation in conservative Islamic communities.  Writers who go the extent she did to accomplish her work help make humankind smarter.

The Global War on Christians - book review

Review of The Global War on Christians by John L. Allen Jr.

            Perhaps the greatest affirmation I could offer an author is his or her work has spurred me to the point that I feel the need to act.  John Allen accomplished that with me in this outstanding work.

            Current through the middle of 2013, Allen tracks the way Christians are under fire around the world.  From my reading of the media, of works by other authors, and reports from other watchdog and faith-based organizations, I found Allen’s presentation to be thoroughly credible and accurate as far as I can tell.  I specifically remember reports of many of the incidents he describes.  In one case, a missionary friend of mine described in detail an incident long before it was reported.  Allen’s account matches what someone in the know, my friend, detailed.

            The situation is dire but not hopeless.  Allen communicated both truths.  His detailed chronicling of what’s happening to Christians on every continent was at times exhausting to read. One after another he told of how Christians have been persecuted because they are Christians, or because as Christians they felt the call of God to remain in dangerous contexts.  It was not an enjoyable read, but the author had no desire to entertain.  He wanted to shock the Christ follower who would dare read a book with his ominous title.  Mission accomplished and in a very good way.

            Throughout I was shocked to the point that I felt I would be unfaithful to Christ if I just set the book aside and did not respond in a tangible way.  I found myself thinking, “What do I do?”  Allen knew any sensitive reader would pose this question.  He dedicates chapter 14 to offering numerous thoughts about how his readers could respond.  Leading up to the section on specific suggestions, I thought, “He better mention prayer.”  It was the first suggestion (p. 280).  The ideas that followed are helpful in setting the believer on the path of the solidarity, participation, and brotherhood with Christians suffering around the world.

            Allen’s presentation is also balanced.  He admitted some of the suffering comes from Christians persecuted by Christians.  Some suffering is not necessarily because the victims follow Jesus.  And Christians are sometimes guilty of inflicting harm on others.  Also, Allen did not give too much attention to any one group, but recognized all who would fall under the definition ‘Christian.’  I did not discern his own affiliation until he identified himself as an American Catholic.

            The book is not perfect as no book is.  As previously mentioned, I found it tiresome to read story after story of persecution.  In some cases, what he describes really might not fall under the category of persecution.  In a few incidents, he could be accused of framing the evidence to fit his argument rather than simply assessing the evidence.  And, he might be guilty of a bit of hyperbole.

            However, I strongly assert that these possible critiques are refutable because he case is so strong.  I already was aware of the issue.  Having read his book, I feel more strongly and more knowledgeable.

            The best endorsement I can give is this – READ THIS BOOK.  I give it 5 stars because that’s highest available ranking.  Even more important, I am personally going to recommend that pastors I know read and respond to this book.  And in 2014, I am going to go back to chapter 14 and hold it up to my own life.  Where can I make changes so that I am active in coming alongside my persecuted Christian family around the globe?  How can I reposition my own life so that I feel the sting of persecution and the joy of being aligned with Jesus?

Disclaimer - I received this book for free from WaterBrookMultnomah Publishing Group for this review.

A Life of Intensity, Urgency, and Meaning

I begin 2014 reading Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi Ali.  She is my peer, born just 3 months before me.  She has lived a life vastly different than mine.  A Somali, she made it out of that Muslim country and out of Islam altogether.  I was surprised to see that the forward to her story was written by noted author and celebrate atheist Christopher Hitchens.  I did not realize her escape from oppression had led her to atheism, but someone not likely associate with the late Hitchens unless she was an atheist herself.

I checked out Ali on google.  The summary describes her as “a Somali-born American feminist and atheist activist.”  Her blog confirms this http://give.theahafoundation.org/blog-0/.  From the posts I skimmed, it seems clear that her main subject matter is the abuse of women in Muslim cultures.  I am only a few pages into her book, and I will read it all the way through.  It is a powerful story.  I say that even as I am male and an avowed religionist.

OK, I would never refer to myself as a ‘religionist,’ but Hitchens was consistent in his contempt for religion – Christianity, Islam, it did not matter.  He was not simply a nonbeliever.  He was aggressively opposed to believers.  I have watched You Tube videos of his debates with William Lane Craig and Alister McGrath.   In those instances, Hitchens displayed a quick wit and a thoroughly unconvincing case for atheism.  I took away from both events a great admiration for the gracious patience of both Craig and McGrath.

Reading Hitchens’ forward in Ali’s book got me thinking about him again and thanks to Google and my daughter waking at 2:45AM (with a fever which always makes her talk in her sleep and insist on sleeping with mommy), I am at my kitchen table with time and reading material.  I am particularly interested in a 2011 Huffington Post column by Paul Brandeis Raushenbush.  He is an American Baptist minister and was the dean of religious life and the chapel at Princeton University. 

Raushenbush’s column is titled “When an Atheist dies.”  But in it, he writes “When an atheist dies it is wrong to wonder what is happening to them now that they are dead.”  My question is why?  Why is it wrong for Christians who believe in eternal life to wonder about the eternity of someone who assaulted (through literature, not violence) Christianity?  Christianity is all about proclaiming that Jesus is Lord.  Raushenbush, a Christian minister, was the director of religious life (a life lived under the lordship of Jesus) at Princeton University.  Why would he say it is wrong to wonder about the eternity of Hitchens, a man who rejected the lordship of Jesus?

I am not saying Christians ought to rejoice at Hitchens’ death.  We should not.  I do not definitively declare Hitchens hell-bound.  God did not consult with me on eternal judgment for Christopher Hitchens or myself or anyone else.  But, I am a pastor and have presided over numerous funerals and have spoken to people about God and life and eternity.  I have had these conversations over and over in my 20+ years in ministry.  People want to know about life after death.  People read.  People know when a famous nonbeliever dies and they ask.  I don’t understand Raushenbush’s assertion that it is wrong to wonder about the atheist’s eternal fate.

I also don’t understand the dichotomy Raushenbush draws between focusing on living in the present and longing for eternity in the Kingdom of God.  He quotes a lengthy passage from Ayaan Hirsi Ali which ends with a John Lennonesque notion that death replaces the “siren song of Paradise and the dread of Hell. … There is nothing more [than this life.] But I want nothing more.”  Reflecting on this passage, Raushenbush writes that concentrating on this life “fills these precious moments that we have on earth with intensity, urgency and inherent meaning.”

To be fair, Raushenbush is specifically writing about atheists and afterlife.  He might write something different were he talking about Christians and afterlife.  So, I have to ask, does one’s beliefs determine one’s eternal reality?  I think it does not.  I think God is real – more real than what I can perceive with my five senses.  God is Lord.  God will not just let me fade into oblivion if I choose not to believe in him.  When I die, if I die as an unbeliever and as a God-rejecter, I will be judged by the God I rejected. 

And as for living intensely, I really believe Raushenbush has it completely backwards.  The most alive moments of my life came when I was acutely aware of the reality of and presence of Heaven.  In Ethiopia, with a mission group, I fed a plate of supper to a handicapped street woman and her child.  Both were clad in rags.  All that they owned was on their backs.  Maybe sharing supper with the poor doesn’t qualify as living intensely for Mr. Raushenbush.  For me, it was invigorating.  I was blessed beyond words.  I would never have been there if not for my belief in God.  No, I do not understand how atheism fills the present with “intensity, urgency and inherent meaning.”

I cannot imagine a more preposterous notion.  I get what Raushenbush is saying.  The atheist has nothing more, so he has to get the most out of “the now.”  Surely Raushenbush would acknowledge that Hitchens is an exception and that there are plenty of atheists who waste their lives on trivial things and hollow materialistic pursuits.  There are plenty of Christians who do the same, by the way.  Hitchens did not have intensity, urgency, and meaning because he was an atheist.  His life had those qualities because he was a crusader for atheism.  His mission was to defeat religion and because he was a talented writer, he garnered the admiration of Christians like Raushenbush.  In fact, Raushenbush, again I emphasize, a Christian minister – ordained to lead others in following Jesus, lauded the life of someone whose fame came at least in part for this creative and articulate rejection of Jesus.  Hitchens said terrible things.  But, he said them well.  So we must acknowledge that he lives well.

I am grateful for all three – Ali, Hitchens, and Raushenbush.  I am grateful to Ali for sharing her story.  I pray for women who are harmed and mutilated in cultures that do not honor their humanity.  I am grateful to Hitchens for raising the bar and forcing brilliant Christians like McGrath and Craig to articulate reasonable defenses of Christianity.  And I am grateful for the way Raushenbush’s article forces me to think about these things.  I pray in 2014, I will focus on the Kingdom of God.  I pray I will see it. I pray that in seeing it, I will live with intensity, urgency and meaning.

Christians in Syria

An Appeal to the Prince of Peace

            An American Christmas involves for Christians much of what it involves for non-Christians.  We buy gifts, go to parties, sing carols, set up trees, dress in red and green, take a bit of time off work, and spend time with family members we might not see the rest of the year.  Christmas in America feels familiar for Christ-followers and unbelievers alike.

            Christians in America do experience some particularly Christian accents in the season.  Worship includes the lighting of Advent candles.  A worship service is scheduled for Christmas Eve.  The scriptures read in worship during the month of December are intentionally arranged so that they set the theological and liturgical expectation of the coming of the Savior and Messiah, Jesus Christ. 

            Included in those readings is Psalm 122:8b-9.  “I will say, ‘peace be with you.’ Because of the house of the Lord our God, I will seek your good.”  Also, Psalm 146:8-9 is one of the Advent passages read in churches.  “The Lord raises up those who are oppressed; … the Lord protects foreigners.”  American Christians are not oppressed.  For the most part, even with the secularization of society, American Christians are not “foreigners.”  They feel at home living out their Christian Christmas in America.

            Does it make any difference for believers in Syria that they are Christian and it is Christmas?  The Washington Post reports that Christians are vulnerable to extremist splinter rebel groups.[i]  While both the Syrian government and the Syrian Opposition Coalition pledge equality for minority groups, some Jihadists seek to eradicate Christianity from Syria.  The followers of Jesus in that war-torn country have little to no power to resist and are in danger of displacement or annihilation.

            How do those Christians hear the word of God when it says, “the Lord raises up, the Lord protects?”  Has God overlooked them?  Is their suffering an opportunity to witness to the faithfulness of God?  It is easy to type that sitting in a comfortable office in Chapel Hill, NC.

            A recent incident, illustrates the peril of being a Christ follower in the middle of the civil war in this Muslim nation.  On December 2, rebels in the Islamist Nusra Front took over the town of Maaloula including the Greek Orthodox Monastery.  Now several nuns are being held as hostages.[ii]  The Christianity practiced by these women is in radically different form than the casual appearing American evangelicalism.  But, Syrian nuns and American evangelicals worship the same Jesus.  They are bonded together in Christ. 

            This Christmas, the Americans will enjoy the soft warmth of big meals, family gathered, and children laughing.  The Syrian sisters will pray to survive.  If they do, what then?  What future is there for the Christian faith in Syria? For that matter, what future is there for any Syrian in that nation that is overrun by violence and death?

            The residents of the Heavenly throne room exalt Jesus for redeeming people from every tribe, language, people, and nation (Revelation 5:9).  Syria is included in the gathering of the redeemed.  There are Christ-followers there, right now, and the Christmas ahead of them is not like the one American Christians will enjoy.  We in America are right to enjoy the blessings we have.  We are right to celebrate the coming of Jesus and the life we have in his name. 

Our celebration, though, is complicated.  As we smile and sing, we also carry the burdens of pain of the people around us and of our brothers and sisters in Christ around the world.  We must take a moment away from our parties and festive worship times, and we must go forcefully to God in prayer.  We must call God to account.  We must read the Psalms proclaiming what God will do for the downtrodden and we must demand that God do this for Syrian Christians.

In prayer, we plead with God.  We remind God that God has made promises.  We bring up the issue that Jesus has died for these Syrians and they are God’s children.  We pray like it matters, like it is an issue of life or death.  Because it is.  And we pray as if God will do something with our prayers.  He will.  Christians everywhere look to Isaiah 9:6.  We call our Lord the “Prince of Peace.”  Between now and Christmas day, may each Christian enjoying a comfortable life in American go in prayers of desperation to our Prince of Peace on behalf of our Syrian brothers and sisters.  May this Christmas be a time when God does unexpected and miraculous things in a part of the world that is seemingly lost to chaos.  God can.  Pray that salvation will come. 

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[i] Loveday Morris, October 4, 2013, http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2013-10-04/world/42686197_1_syrian-christians-maaloula-syria-s

[ii] Reuters - http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/12/02/us-syria-crisis-maloula-idUSBRE9B10LD20131202

Muslims and Christians

Voice of the Martyrs is an organization that tracks pockets of extreme persecution of Christians, by Muslims (http://www.persecution.com/).  One of the features of the organization is a weekly email that calls for prayer for specific situations.  I receive the emails on Fridays and part of my Friday prayer is for Christians who undergo violent persecution all over the world.

In many of the cases, the story is of Christ-followers in predominantly Islamic regions.  The persecution runs from job loss to eviction to beatings to imprisonment to loss of life.  The website does not report on incidents of Christians committing acts of violence and evil against Muslims.  I believe that happens and in the name of balance, I wish that the website would not make it appear as if Christians were thoroughly innocent.  However, VOM data aside, I believe that more violence between the two religions occurs from Muslims attacking Christians than vice versa.

That is the current state of affairs.  In the past, during the Crusades, Christian violence against Muslims was hideous, sinful, and a complete violation of the way of Jesus.  What we see in the world today is not an indication that Christians are more civilized or less hateful than Muslims.  I wish to emphasize that Christians are no better than Muslims.  We are all human beings and this means two things.

First, it means we are all made in God’s image.  There is much good about us.  We have conscience and we have creative capacity.  We are self-aware.  We have the capacity to believe and to love; all of us. 

Second, because we are all humans, each one of us has inherited the legacy of the fall.  Whether you believe there was a literal Adam and Eve or you believe their story is a type-story, an origin story, either way, you have inherited a tendency to sin.  So have I.  We sin and when you take a life-time of sins combined with the lifetimes of billions of other sinners, you get a world with wars, prostitution, addiction, sexual sin, greed, and deception.  It happens among individuals and among nations. 

But all of this is just to say, Muslims and Christians are people.  I think the best bet for people is to acknowledge that Jesus is Lord and that in Him, God came to earth and the Kingdom of God was inaugurated.  My Muslims friends will disagree.  They will call Jesus a prophet who is secondary to the supreme prophet, Muhammad.  We should be allowed to talk about our disagreements in an atmosphere of peace and love.  The conversation should happen at a neighborly table where there is plenty of bread and tea and no guns are allowed.  People should be free to assess the truth claims of a religion and then select the path they will walk.

I appreciate this report from Voice of the Martyrs this past Friday.  It is the story of an Indonesian Muslim Cleric who left Islam to follow Jesus as Lord.  His Father-in-law threw him out and he lost all his possessions and his home.  It is a story of dispossession.  However, it does not end with the man begging as a vagrant.  A Muslim friend took him in.

This is extremely important.  His friend practiced the faith he had abandoned.  He was a Muslim.  The man who had converted to Christ was now put out, and this Muslim, out of friendship, took him in.  Christians need to recognize that within the various Muslim groups, there are kind-hearted people looking to do good, helpful things.  The Indonesian convert’s story is an example.  A dispossessed Christian was given hope when his Muslim friend extended hospitality. 

Stories of violence always get told.  They make the front pages.  The stories of hope, of people helping each other, slip through the cracks.  I invite my Christian friends to seek out stories of Muslims doing good things.  If people in these two groups will extend themselves to tell each other’s most positive stories, it has the potential to counteract all the negativity that dominates the media and colors our views of each other.  

Islam and Christianity

Christianity, by its nature, is expansive.  The mission of every Christian is to share Jesus with the world and announce the Kingdom of God that was inaugurated in the coming, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus.

A popular notion in American and Western culture is 'tolerance,' and contained within this notion is the idea that people should not try to win others to their religion or cause.  Christians should not try to evangelize Jews or Muslims or atheists.  We should be happy being Christians and let others be happy being what they are.  There a few problems with this notion.

First, it is impossible for a Christian to be truly happy if he ignores Jesus' command to go and make disciples of all nations (Matthew 28:19-20).  If we think we can roll along and just not deal with the "evangelism thing," we will be out of step with the Holy Spirit of God.  Some Christians may be uniquely talented in evangelism.  But all Christians are called to practice evangelism and live evangelistically.  The Bible is full of stories about people made uncomfortable by God when they try to ignore his call on their lives.  We cannot truly follow Jesus if we ignore evangelism.

A second problem with the notion of tolerance as I have described it is it is not accurate.  The fact that Christians attempt to share Jesus does not impinge upon a Muslim's ability to live happily as a Muslim.  I will lay this out by way of analogy. 

Mormons want the entire world to become Mormon.  They are very distinct in their evangelistic approach.  They dress in an easily recognizable way and they go door-to-door.  Advocates of 'tolerance,' as it is popularly understood, would criticize this aggressive evangelistic approach taken by Mormons.  They would say Mormons are not allowing non-Mormons to be happy as they are. 

But, I am a non-Mormon.  And I do not feel put upon by their approach to evangelism or proselyting if your prefer.  In fact, if someone, in the name of tolerance, tried to prevent Mormons from spreading their faith or Muslims from spreading their faith, I would fight to defend the Mormons and Muslims.  I want them to have the right to share their faith and I want that same right.  Mormons coming to my door do not ruin my happiness or affect my practice of evangelical Christiantiy.  If I am feeling up to it, I may invite them in and engage in a conversation.  If I am not, I try to politely say I am already committed as a follower of Jesus.  Either way, Mormon evangelizing efforts do not bother me in the least. 

The thing about tolerance as I think a lot of people understand it is it eliminates real conversation at a deep level.  It removes critical thinking.  "Go along to get along" is intellectually lazy and spiritual inexcusible.  Christians are called to confront the world with the love of Jesus.  We are to make this confrontation in a the way of love, peace, and gentleness.  No matter how our efforts to share Jesus are received, we are to share his love.  But to avoid evangelism is to say Jesus didn't know what he was doing when he commissioned the disciples and the early church.  I believe he knew exactly what he was doing.

Without him, people are cut off from God.  I think this includes Muslims and Mormons, Jews and Hindus, and everybody else.  So my life is committed to sharing the love of Jesus and the salvation he offers.  I greatly respect those of other faiths who share their beliefs evangelistically as I share mine.  We disagree, to be sure.  But we can talk about our disagreements in a friendly way.  We can meet in love and be friends even when our foundational faith convictions are to opposed to each other.  If I have the truth on my side, the Holy Spirit will convict the other's heart.  That's God's job.  I cannot convict another's heart and I shouldn't try.  I should just represent Jesus well and tell others about Him.

I want to close by recommending two articles.  The first is an interview with a Muslim who has become a Christ-follower.  The way he follows and worships Jesus might seem very odd for Christians in America, but I think he is reaching people the aver American Christian never will.  Check it out - http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2013/january-february/insider-movement-islam-wheres-jesus.html?order=&start=1

The second article is from a Muslim perspective and is about some Muslims who are trying to recapture the good in the term "Jihad."  I invite you to seriously consider what these Muslims are trying to do.  I see a similar effort in Christanity in trying to recover the good in the word "evangelical."  - http://www.cnn.com/2013/02/03/us/myjihad-campaign/index.html?hpt=hp_t3

Divinity of Jesus: The Difference between Christian and Muslim Views

 

            The ocean is a big place.  We had a chance, as a family, to go to the beach earlier this summer.  For a second time in my life I was humbled by having to ask a fellow swimmer to help me out of a riptide.  It was pretty close to shore but it caught me.  Most people don’t like to need help and I felt especially small considering this wasn’t a place with w0rld-class surfing waves. 

            The ocean can do that – make one feel small.  In ancient times, the ocean was a place of industry; fishermen could make good money.  The ocean was the pathway to exploration.  What’s out there?  The ocean was the highway to commerce and the means by which people encountered one another.  Dominant armadas could enable empires to rule the world.

            The ocean was a also a source of mystery and fear.  What creatures lurk beneath the black depths?  How deep does it go?  There were no satellites, no light houses, no GPS, and no coast guard.  The ocean was seen as a place of danger and death. 

            When we were at the ocean and I was raucously riding the waves but also trying to stay close enough to the shore so I could handle any riptides, we looked out, far out to sea.  We watched fishing boats.  We tried to sight dolphins.  We think we saw one.  But the most amazing thing was a man, guy.  He was way, way out there, swimming for all his might.  He’s wasn’t swimming in.  He was swimming parallel to the shore.  I thought, who is this guy?  If he got a cramp or if he became complete exhausted, he was dead because he was so far out, no one could get to him.  In fact, it’s unlikely anyone would see him unless they were looking hard.  He must be a serious triathlete who does the iron-man competition. 

            As amazing as his stamina and strength are in swimming, even he is small next to the expanse of the ocean.  It is beautiful, breathtaking, and awe-inspiring.  And the ocean declares that Jesus is God. 

            Why is this declaration so important?  And why is it so important to do more than just say, “Jesus is God?”

            I write a blog and occasionally I write on the way Islam and Christianity co-exist in the world.  Sometimes this coexistence is a violent collision.  Sometimes it is a warm friendship.  In my writings I make it clear that I see the two faiths as fundamentally contradictory.  They cannot both be true because Isalm sees Jesus as a prophet.  To be sure, Muslims believe in most of the miracles reported in the New Testament.  Muslims revere Jesus.  Muslims love Jesus.

            However, Christians worship Jesus.  This is anathema to Isalm.  To say something is anathema is to say it is so detestably untrue it calls for damnation.  Muslims feel it is damnable to call Jesus ‘God’ because this is a direct assault on monotheism.  God alone is God, and in their view, to say that Jesus is God is to have a second God.

            Christians are as fiercely monotheistic as Muslims or Jews for that matter.  We believe there is one God.  And this one God exists in three forms and three manifestations and the three have a relationship with each other within the Godhead.  Father God, Son Jesus, Holy Spirit – one God; God is three in one.  It is utterly against Islam to say Jesus is God.  It is utterly essential to Christianity that we acknowledge Jesus as fully human and fully God. 

            The two religions can co-exist.  We can and should befriend Muslims.  We can and must love Muslims.  That love includes respecting their commitment to their faith.  Respect means if we want to invite a Muslim to consider Jesus, it has to be that, an invitation.  If he’s not interested, we still love him and respect him and honor him as a friend even when we’re completely convinced that he’s wrong about Jesus. 

            Along these lines Muslim readers have commented on my blog writings.  There is no way Jesus could be God, they say.  One reader linked me to a Muslim talk-show.  It’s a setting that skews younger, is hip, cool and the host had a guest who was a Christian pastor but then converted to Islam.  He was giving 10 reasons why Jesus could not be God.

            We can stop right here and just say, “Who cares.”  We think Jesus is God and he doesn’t so we think he is wrong.  There.  Now can we all just get on with our lives?  We can, sure, but if we take that kind of a shrug-of-the shoulder approach, then our faith is not a reasoned faith.  It is not a thought-out faith.  It is one we inherit, one we accept because it was given from people we trust, and it is one based on our emotions.  Our emotions tell us we are sinners who need Jesus; people we trust – authors of scripture, pastors, youth pastors, Sunday school teachers – tell us Jesus forgives us and we need Him.  And so by trust and by emotion we are Christ-followers. 

            That is all good and nothing I am saying negates that or detracts from it.  What I offer this morning adds to that emotional confession born out of a faith community and relationships with Christians and relationship with the Holy Spirit.  We are to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, strength, and mind.  To Love God with the mind, I think includes a reasoned defense or explanation of why we believe what we believe to be true.  And this is where the ocean and Jesus’s demonstration in Mark’s gospel comes into the conversation.

            The ex-Muslim turned youth pastor gives 10 reasons why Jesus never says he is God.  We might say, “Oh yes he does say it.  He says, ‘the father and I are one,’ in John 10:30.”  Be careful with that response.  Remember, this Muslim was a Christian.  He knows many of the references on which we base our belief that Jesus is God.  He looks at that and says, ‘wait a minute.   That means Jesus and God are united, one in purpose, not one in being.  In those terms, God and I are also one because I am united with God.’  He makes this point pretty clearly.  His articulation is not good but his arguments have logic.  Many of the standard verses we use to show that Jesus is God are well-known to Muslims and they have a ready refutation. 

            The host of the talk show says, “If Jesus was really God, why doesn’t he say, ‘I am God?’”  A few years, this very question troubled me, and I went searching for that verse, and it’s not in there.  It’s not in John’s gospel, the primary source for Jesus’ “I am” statements.  It is not in the other gospels.  Why doesn’t Jesus say, “I am God”?

            We need to be able to answer that.  The world is shrinking.  It’s not just in college towns and big cities.  Across America people are setting up homes, people who do not have a Protestant or Catholic worldview.  We can stay isolated, stick to spending time with people who think like us and talk like us.  But if we do that, we dare not call ourselves Christ-followers.  He calls us beyond our familiar circles and once we step out of our comfort zones and into conversations and friendships with people who see the world total differently, we have to be prepared to say why we think what we think.  “Jesus is God.” 

            Why do we think so?  Did he say that?  Not in those words. 

            The statement would have been absurd to the ears of the first century Jew Palestine.  So instead of saying, “I am God,” Jesus said things only God can say.  Jesus did things only God will do.  And Jesus received things only God can receive.  In this way, there was no mistake.  Everyone around him understood him to be claiming to be God; otherwise, they would not have killed him. 

            I am thankful for David Garland’s commentary on Mark’s Gospel.  Before reading it, I always thought the place to look for declarations of Jesus’ divinity was the Gospel of John.

            In Mark 6, Jesus is rejected by his old neighbors in his home town of Nazareth.  Herod, the Jewish King, a puppet of Rome, imprisons and executes John the Baptist, Jesus’ cousin and the prophet whose preaching and practice of baptism paved the way for Jesus’ ministry.  On a remote hillside, Jesus feeds 5000 people by miraculously multiplying one person’s lunch. 

            Then he does something very human.  He sends the disciples off on their boat out into the Sea of Galilee.  And in isolation, he prays.  Human beings pray to God.  Jesus was exceptional as a human being and he was 100% human.  His wisdom was supreme; his prayer life incredible; and his love perfect.

            While he was praying, the disciples were out to sea and straining against the wind.  This is different than what we read in Mark 4.  There the windstorm was so fierce, it kicked up the waves to the point that the boat was swamped and in real danger of sinking.  In that situation, Jesus commanded the storm to be silent and it obeyed.  That account illustrates the same truth this one does, but the circumstances are different.  There Jesus was in the boat and the disciples were about to die.  Here in Mark 6, the disciples are not going to die, but they’re also not making progress.  They’re straining at the oars against the power of the mighty sea and the uncontrollable wind.  As he’s praying, he sees them.  This must have been a vision.  Still, this is a human thing.  Peter, Paul and many others had visions while praying.  The clincher is what Jesus does next.

            Alone on the land, praying, in a vision, Jesus sees the disciples as they row at night, and he walks on the sea.  Who does that?  Who just walks across the water?  Jews in the first century would have had a ready answer that they would have accepted without question.  Thinking back to their scripture, they would remember the prophet Habakkuk.  “Was your wrath against the rivers, O Lord?  Or your anger against the rivers or your rage against the sea?  … You trampled the sea with your horses” (Habakkuk 3:8a-b, 15a).

            They would remember the book of Job where God says to Job, “Who shut for the doors of the sea? … Have you entered the springs of the sea or walked in the recesses of the deep” (Job 38:8a, 16).  Who?  God.  God walks on the sea.  People were terrified of the unseen depths, but God walks in the recesses of the deep at His pleasure.  At His pleasure, he shuts the sea as you or I would shut a door.

            The disciples and later, Mark’s first readers would remember Psalm 107.  “They saw the deeds of the Lord, his wondrous works in the deep.  For he commanded and raised the stormy wind, which lifted up the waves of the sea.  … He made the storm be still and the waves of the sea were hushed” (107:24-24, 29).  Ancient Israelites spoke in scripture; “it was written;” “as the prophets said;” “Moses wrote.”  This is how they conveyed ideas and understood the world.  So, in these terms, Jesus made very clear statements and some of his statements came through actions.

            Note the end of Mark 6, verse 48.  Jesus is walking on the water and it says he intended to pass them by.  He didn’t.  They were terrified and he got into the boat to calm them.  They had not been terrified by the wind.  They strained against but did not fear it.  But a man walking on the water sent them into heart-thumping panic and Jesus came to them.  But his intention was to pass by.  Why?

            Moses, the greatest of prophets wanted to see God.  God set Moses in the cleft of a rock, and passed by and Moses saw God’s backside glory.  Elijah, the great prophet in the book of 1^st Kings, the one who never died but was just taken up to Heaven in a Chariot of Fire, got so depressed in his fear he was suicidal.  Again, God set him in a cave, and in silence passed by him.  Who are the Old Testament two prophets who join Jesus on the mount of transfiguration in Mark 9?  Moses and Elijah. 

            The disciples out on the sea were not in trouble in the sense of needing Jesus to save them from imminent death.  He didn’t need to walk on water to save them.  He walked on the water so they could see that God was passing by again.  The final verse of this section says their hearts were hardened.  Shortly after this, James, John, and Peter, would come with Jesus to a mountain top where Moses and Elijah visited from the Heavenly beyond to watch God pass by. 

            When Moses asks God’s name in Exodus 3, God says, “I am.”  That is God’s self-identification.  In Greek, that phrase is rendered “ego emi.”  “Ego emi” from Greek to English can be rendered, “It is I,” or “It is me,” or “I am.”  Knowing this, it is pretty clear in John’s Gospel that Jesus is saying “I am” to indicate that he is the same God who visited Moses and named himself “I am.”  I never paid attention to “I am” statements from Jesus in the other Gospels.  But, here, on the sea, a place of dread and terror, the disciples see what sailors fear most, a phantasm, a ghostly creature come to take then to death.

            To their fear, Jesus says, “Take heart, Ego emi, it is I, I am.”  In Mark’s symbolic world, no clearer declaration can be made.  Mark’s gospel shouts that Jesus is God in human flesh, to be followed and worshiped.  To hear Jesus say, “I am God,” you have to turn to Revelation 1:17.  At the end of the verse he says, “I am the alpha and the omega, the first and the last, the living one.”  That is a direct reference to God in apocalyptic language, and Jesus makes that reference to himself.

            Some skeptics won’t be satisfied by such evidence and that’s just the nature of things.  Muslim friends will believe Jesus walked on the water and say it didn’t mean he was God.  Jewish friends will deny that it really happened.  Modernists and naturalists will say it could not have happened and thus it is just a legend.  When Mark wrote it, he did not believe he was writing a legend.  He believed he was describing how Jesus demonstrated for his disciple who he was and is. 

            This is who we worship and follow.  This is the Lord, the master of our lives.  We are in service to Him for eternity.  This is our creator, redeemer, protector, defender, and savior, the one who forgives us of all sin, and makes us new each day.  All that we are depends on who He is.  And thus we submit ourselves to Him completely.

AMEN