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Welcome to The Musings of Tyler Hurst where I look at issues surrounding church, culture, and technology through Christian theology, Christian philosophy, and Christian ethics. As a pastor and student of spiritual formation, public (political) theology, and ethics these are important issues to me and their intersection often is missed.

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoy the thoughts,

tdh

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In this newsletter I want to review Section I, Part I of Francis Schaeffer’s True Spirituality. But first…

1. The San Francisco 49ers start 2-0 - My first two initials td are not an accident, my father selected my first two names in order to have “touchdown” as my initials. Being a 49ers fan is a genetic condition then. After taking to the vaunted Los Angeles Rams in Melbourne, Australia and they did not give into the “trap” game against the…less vaunted… Miami Dolphins. While my fantasy football team is getting its butt handed to it, my real team is doing rather well.

2. The ending of protestant post-liberalism - This is probably way too nerdy, but I have been thinking about this essay from Dale Coulter that the guys on Mere Fidelity podcast talked about a few weeks ago. Coulter does a really excellent job of unpacking in brief order the historical development—however, what I have been thinking about is the question of the subtitle: “The last major voices of postliberal Protestantism are in their eighties, and nothing is replacing them;” what if what replaced them was The Gospel Coalition? And in a post-Keller, post-Carson, post-Piper era, is it running on fumes? If so, is there a new coalition coming?

3. Is It Really a Sin to Cohabitate? - Speaking of The Gospel Coalition an article over there on whether it is really a sin to cohabitate caught my eye as this is a question I have gotten multiple times from men just slightly younger than myself, but out of their early twenties. My hypothesis is that younger millennials are those that hit peak anti-purity culture and thus are those who are wrestling most with what the movement got right and got wrong.

4. Increasing discussion of virtues - I really want to write two books on virtue, so I was interested in this piece chronicling the rise of dialogue around the virtues. Check it out and pick up one of the recent works on it.

5. What the church needs now is maturity and leadership - On the Rebuilders Podcast run by evangelical thought leader (**with a sweet Aussie accent**) Mark Sayers an interesting discussion took place as to what the church needs to be in the next stage of modernity. Sayers does not go so far as to say he regrets his time trying to be relevant, but does say that what

Kyle Strobel has shared that in his conversations with Dallas Willard, Willard encourage Strobel to “re-tradition” himself as he explored spiritual formation as a theologian. That is, Willard encouraged Strobel to explore spiritual formation within his evangelical and reformed tradition. Strobel went on to study Jonathan Edwards. As I prepare myself for the lead pastorate of an evangelical church, I want to take some time to do the same. Broadly speaking I believe my church needs to think more and more deeply about spiritual maturity, so I want to retradition by spending some time rereading some evangelical books that have shaped and fashioned my thinking and formation that are within the evangelical tradition. The place I want to start is with a book that is both comparatively recent and I encountered early in my development—my early to mid twenties: Francis Schaeffer’s True Spirituality.

In this newsletter, I only have the time to cover a portion of the book. Particularly, I will look at Section I (titled “Freedom Now from the Bonds of Sin”), Part I (titled “Basic Considerations of True Spirituality”).

Preface as Prologue

When opening up True Spirituality it is important not to overlook the “Preface.” I always read prefaces hoping for some nugget buried in them—there rarely is, which is why the author of the preface to G.K. Chesterton’s great Manalive, wrote that prefaces primarily exist to get the reader started on page 10 so that they can feel productive. But this is not the case with Schaeffer’s preface to True Spirituality because it provides important prologue to where the book is coming from and establishes an important note of evangelical spirituality.

Schaeffer writes about the book arising out of a time in 1951-1952 in which he faced a spiritual crisis and “realized that in honesty I had to go back and rethink my whole position” (9). Over this rethinking process, Schaeffer came to a renewed appreciation of the Christian faith, but recognized a short coming in his biblical and theological education. Schaeffer explains, “Gradually I saw that the problem was that with all the teaching I received after I was a Christian, I had heard little about what the Bible says about meaning of the finished work of Christ for our present lives” (10).

It is interesting how often Schaeffer is critical of Kierkegaard and, yet, how existential reality of the Christian faith is important to both Schaeffer’s biography and evangelicalism broadly speaking. I reviewing the preface, I am reminded—as Tim Keller used to explain—that the Christian faith has to be rationally and emotionally (or existentially) satisfying.

Conversion to Christ with Gratitude and Contentment

Schaeffer’s first point on true spirituality is that the Christian faith is about real conversion to Christ. This is central to evangelical spirituality. As David Bebbington notes one of the four elements of evangelicalism is conversionism: the view that there needs to be a real transition from death to life. Existentially, we might not recognize the exact moment of conversion, but we do recognize that a conversion has taken place. As Schaeffer explains we are not Christians by simply hoping to live a Christian life (a la a Jordan Peterson who advocates for Christian ethics, but has not given up his Jungian vision of Christian faith as a useful myth). Nor does it simply mean having a religious experience. This second point is crucial as we think about the deconversion conversation. Those who “deconvert” often do so from a point “knowing.” They believe they have tried Christianity and found it wanting, but their testimonies of this “trying” often rely on a conversion experience that is little more than an emotional response a manipulative talk that had been proceeded and followed by hyper emotive music in the context of a large peer (particularly teenage) gathering. This, I would argue, is not an appropriate way to attain conversion. It is a way of manufacturing a religious experience akin to religious happenings of the 1800’s.

This conversion should not be completely without feeling, as it should involve the conviction of sin, but we must be careful—as Schaeffer notes—to not reduce sin to the mere psychological feeling of guilt, but recognize guilt as an actual reality. We are really sinners, which is to say lawbreakers, before a holy God, who will judge and do justice. There ought to be a weight of feeling having our sin confronted and maybe a legitimate weight of feeling associated gratitude for forgiveness and salvation. But again, gratitude is not primarily a feeling—it is a reality of being grateful and the action of giving thanks. Schaeffer writes, “Love must carry with it a ‘thank you,’ not in a superficial or ‘offical’ way, but in being thankful and saying, in the mind or with the voice, ‘thank you’ to God” (33).

Schaeffer links gratitude to contentment. At the end of chapter 1 the reader recognizes the difficulty of evangelical spiritual formation and maturity in modern America. The therapeutic worldview and the language of “feelings” has so comprehensively dominated our culture that it has monopolized our understanding of important terminology that many have no association with critical concepts like guild and gratitude that are not merely descriptions of feelings. It will be imperative for an evangelical spirituality to rescue and retrieve the meanings of these words.

Negative and Positive Visions

As the Schaeffer continues he draws brings up another standard evangelical commitment: crucicentrism. The uniqueness of Christ’s death and its importance is critical to evangelical faith and, therefore, to evangelical spirituality.

Christ’s death and resurrection as substitutionary was totally unique; yet we are called upon to imitate Christ in our attitude. Our daily, moment-by-moment walk should follow his example as he ‘humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even death of the cross’ (Philippians 2:8). (55)

For Schaeffer, Christ death is a model for true spirituality. We will need to die to ourselves and learn humility. This is the negative of spirituality. “True spirituality does not stop at the negative, but without the negative—in comprehension and practice—we are not ready to go on” (56). Jesus does not stay dead so our spirituality will not be merely negative—there is resurrection, so to there is positivity and life in evangelical spirituality.

Schaeffer does not say specifically, but it seems like he has a developmental spirituality in mind. Our spirituality begins with conversion and new life followed by learning and discipline—a school of discipleship. There will be freedom and life, but only as self-denial and humility turns to wisdom that enables freedom, love, and life.

Historical Reality, not Merely Feeling

Schaeffer moves on to engage liberal theology. It is important to remember that human theology is grounded in a historical moment with real challenges and real historical opponents. Schaeffer not only wants to give those apart from the Christian faith an understanding of following Jesus, he also wants to engage those participating in a false version of the Christian faith that overly spiritualizes it. American and German liberals had “demythologized” and rationalized away the supernatural parts of Christianity. This eviscerates it of all connection to God who acts in space and time.

This is the basic consideration of the Christian life. First, Christ died in history. Second, Christ rose in history. Third, we died with Christ in history, when we accepted Him as our Savior. Fourth, we will be raised in history, when He comes again. Fifth, we are to live by faith now as through we were now dead, as though we have already died. And sixth, we are to live now by faith as though we have now already been raised from the dead.

Now what does this mean in practice, so that it will not be just words going over our heads? First of all, it certainly means this: that in our thoughts and lives now we are to live as though we had already died, been to Heaven, and come back again as risen. (71)

Just as Christ lived, died, and rose in real human history, so our Christian lives are lived in real human history. The importance of this is not only apologetic, though there is that, but Schaeffer, again, is concerned to anchoring into another evangelical commitment: activism. Our Christian lives will only have real life effect if it is about real life happenings.

But our primary call is to be alive to God moment by moment. Our “doing good” should not become a thing in itself and thus spoil the most basic call of being alive to the presence of God.

So what is the primary Christian calling on the basis of all this? The primary calling is a calling moment by moment to be dead to all things, that we might be alive to God at this moment. The “doing good” at any one moment is above everything else to rest upon our being yielded to God. (74)

This moment-by-moment nature of the Christian life is premised on the moment-by-moment reality of Jesus’s life. But it is important to recognize that we must not confuse justification with sanctification, we must not assume that the moment-by-moment Christian life is what saves us. We are saved by the life, death, and resurrection of Christ. That is our justification.

Justification is once for all. At one moment my guilt is declared gone forever. But this is not once for all. This is a moment-by-moment thing—a moment-by-moment being dead to all else and alive to God; a moment-by-moment stepping back by faith into the present world as though we have been raised from the dead. Here is the real positive, after the proper negative. (76)

After justification, we live with a Christian life and we grow in grace—this is sanctification. As Schaeffer says, “True spirituality is not achieved in our own energy” (94).

True Spirituality is Personal

The true spirituality is not mechanical, nor is it reducible to a standard checklist. Yes, there are developmental stages with recognizable elements, but this does not mean that who we are has nothing to do with true spirituality.

It is not that I disappear. I am very much in existence. However, as finite and marked by the Fall, I cannot do the Lord’s work in the lost abnormal, broken world in my own energy, my own cleverness, my own persistence, “charisma,” my own spiritual gifts and so on. I am there, but I must not count on these things as the source of power. Consciously the power must not be of myself. It is the power of the crucified, risen, and glorified Christ, through the agency of the Holy Spirit, by faith. (94)

One of the difficult to navigate parts of evangelical spirituality is the relative importance of the individual. Evangelicalism is a renewal movement of reformed Protestantism and all renewal movements lean into the role of the individual as important and relevant. This is important and necessary emphasis, but the radical and expressive individualism that marks modern western culture is irreconcilable with the Christian faith. So navigating the personal emphasis requires care.

That is enough for now. I’ll pick this up in another newsletter.

I wanted to get back to my reflections on leadership, so I picked up what I think of as the Mark Sayers’ leadership trilogy. I had read A Non-Anxious Presence previously, but not the other two:

• The Feast by Margaret Kennedy

• 40 Questions about Pastoral Ministry by Phil A. Newton

I have taken an extended break from this book, probably have to completely review it when I go to pick it back up again.

• Vida Completiva by Beyung-Chul Han

• The Dignity of Dependance by Leah Limbresco Sargent

• Thinking in Circles by Mary Douglas

• Communion with God by John Owen (Puritan Paperback edition)

• The Church by Brad East

• Evangelical Heritage by David Gustafson

• Becoming God’s Family by Carmen Joy Imes

I have enjoyed Imes’ books, but I will say every now and then she makes what I think to be a comment intended to influence her reader in a certain theological direction by mere assertion on a tangental issue. So, in this book there are occasional elbows to the ribs of complementarians that seem jarring to me as I read. I am largely in agreement with her project, but I see it as a minority position, so argumentation would be strengthened by focusing on the main thing.

• Facing Leviathan by Mark Sayers

• A Non-Anxious Presence by Mark Sayers

Have not started just yet, but did read and review previously.

• Platform to Pillars by Mark Sayers

Not started, nor have I read it previously.

• True Spirituality by Francis Schaeffer

Obviously the point of this post and others to come.

• Interpreting Biblical Metaphors by Erin Heim and Beth Stovell

I often have struggled to provide resources on understanding metaphors in the Bible, it is very easy for us separated by two thousand years and the formation of western civilization. Interpreting Biblical Metaphors is great thus far. I am three chapters in and Heim and Stovell have covered much of the resources I normally use to teach the content—but in a much more accessible manner.

• Christian Ethics by Gilbert Meilaender

I am developing a concept of virtue theory and spiritual formation, Meilaender is a premier ethicist and the lutheran ethicists of note—which is interesting because he is quite well known for his virtue ethics material which is not generally thought of as a primary note in Lutheran vision of ethics. I am hoping this book establishes Meilaender’s understanding of virtue in relationship to the other tools of Christian ethics and maybe a Lutheran view of spiritual formation.

Going back to the fifth thing that stood out to me this week, Mark Sayers, in certain circles is a big deal. He has a knack for cultural interpretation. Though, sometimes I think he get U.S. politics wrong, he is often prescient. Sayers believes the church of the future is not the “relevant” megachurch with a pastor in expensive shoes and a youth pastor’s affect. Rather, it is a church that is mature, seeking to help disciples mature, actively evangelizing and serving the lost, and showing real leadership. A church like that will need to be a church that understands its tradition and the answers and path it provides for believers to follow Christ.

Thanks for reading,

tdh

Hey,

Welcome to The Musings of Tyler Hurst where I look at issues surrounding church, culture, and technology through Christian theology, Christian philosophy, and Christian ethics. As a pastor and student of spiritual formation, public (political) theology, and ethics these are important issues to me and their intersection often is missed.

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoy the thoughts,

tdh

In this post I want to spend some time reflecting on a rather difficult sermon to write. A sermon on the church. I’ll explain more below, but first, here are five things that caught my eye:

1. Three years after Dobbs Americans’ views on abortion are liberal/progressive - The pro-life movement won a massive battle in the war over abortion. Yet, unlike a similar victory on the political left regarding same-sex marriage, views have not shifted toward the pro-life perspective following Dobbs. Maybe this has to do with the fact that many states had federalist skirmishes over abortion following Dobbs, maybe it has to do with the fact that abortion had already been on the books since 1973’s infamous Roe v. Wade decision. Either way, Pew research shows a strong pro-abortion consensus across almost all fifty states. Even states majority pro-life, the majority is slim.

2. Gen Z’ers vision of the future - Over at The Dispatch there is a fascinating article on the misperceptions, unreal expectations, and unaccounted for cultural changes plaguing Gen Z’ers as they enter adulthood. The opening line really caught my eye: “On average, Gen Zers say they’d need to earn a salary of $600,000 per year to feel financially successful.” Wait… what?

3. Young men and technological opt out - The stories and studies about young men dropping out of all the institutions that promote well-being and advance quality of life are a dime a dozen. That does not mean they are not true, studies find significant demoralization among young men. The study over at The Institute of Family Studies shows that young men are supplementing their loss of well-being with digital alternatives. The major concern of IFS is how engagement with pornography will change (read: worsen) with the advance of AI. IFS reports, “We now have nearly two decades of research showing the potential harms of regular pornography consumption, especially for men.” Add to that “The looming impact of AI companions” and there is significant cause for concern.

4. Are worship pastors teachers?: My friend Dan has a very important article considering the teaching role of music and, therefore, music directors/band leaders/worship pastors at churches.

5. A review of Lamb of the Free by Andrew Rillera in Themelios - Themelios is a peer reviewed academic journal produced in Canada and in the US. In the latter it is associated with The Gospel Coalition. This review caught my eye as a reminder of why you should not read John Mark Comer or pay much attention to what he says. Lamb of the Free is not a well argued book, is not published by a major academic or popular Christian publisher, and is written by a relatively unknown scholar who appears to be working out his conservative Christian college (Eternity Bible College) days in Protestant (Fuller Theological Seminary) liberalism (Duke Divinity School). So why care about this book? Why did it get the Kevin DeYoung length review treatment in Themelios? Because John Mark Comer posted this on Instagram last year:

   

• If Comer sustained his position that this book was the “knock out blow” then he should take a look at this review and consider the logical and biblical flaws in the book. It is concerning to me that Comer is one of the most widely read authors in evangelicalism today.

Here I am, it is Saturday afternoon and my small group which meets every other Saturday for breakfast and fellowship just left. So I am sitting down to my computer to finish a sermon. A sermon that I am going to preach tomorrow. This is not ideal.

What is going on?

Late last year as I was constructing the preaching schedule, I suggested to my co-pastor that we do a topical series on major questions that did not use to get asked, but now are asked with some level of regularity. The questions, as I perceive them, arise out of a recognition that the simple answers on offer a few years ago no longer make sense. Many in my church see the world as more complicated than it was a few years ago. So we picked nine topics and decided to introduce the sermon series with a sermon on thinking theologically on Romans 12:1-2. The sermon series is titled The Ancient Faith in Our Modern World:

• Transformed in Christ not Conformed to the Modern World

• The Ancient Faith on Male and Female in Our Modern World

• The Ancient Faith on Marriage in Our Modern World

• The Ancient Faith on Sex in Our Modern World

• The Ancient Faith on Parenting in Our Modern World

• The Ancient Faith on The Church in Our Modern World

• The Ancient Faith on Politics and the State in Our Modern World

• The Ancient Faith on Work in Our Modern World

• The Ancient Faith on Evangelism in Our Modern World

• The Ancient Faith on Spiritual Formation in Our Modern World

Of these topics the one that stood out to me the most was the church; maybe spiritual formation, but the church from a certain perspective is clearly not like the others. And that is the topic for this Sunday.

Over the week, I wrote four thousand word manuscript—I manuscript all my sermons—answering the question how do we misunderstand the church in the modern world and how should we understand the church as adherents to the ancient faith. This, my co-pastor would say, is a sermon I was born to preach. What he means by that is I have sought to bring a deeper ecclesiology and more robust understanding of belonging to our church since arriving. And in some ways, that is the problem.

The Church in Our Modern World

There are just too many ways that our modern world conforms the way we think about the church. Individualism, consumerism, juvenilization, emotionalism and anti-intellectualism. As I think about ways in which we are conformed on our thinking, I get a sense of that there is a kind of philosophical determinism at work, what Jacques Ellul might call “the juvenilizing imperative” or Paul Kingsnorth might dub “the ecclesiological machine.”

Individualism

We are radical individuals. Rather than recounting the argument, I’ll just give you the reading list:

• Robert Bellah and Co., Habits of the Heart

• Charles Taylor, A Secular Age

• Christopher Lasch, Culture of Narcissism

• Joseph Heinrich, The WEIRDEST People in the World

• Philip Reiff, Triumph of the Therapeutic

• Tara Isabella Burton, Self-Made

• Larry Siedentop, The Invention of the Individual

• Carl R. Trueman, The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self

The grandfather of all of these books is Alexis De Tocqueville’s Democracy in America.

As radical individuals we have a difficulty conceiving of and accepting our place in communities. Additionally, our relationship to communities is often premised upon our values and desires—what makes me happy.

Consumerism

In this way, there is little thick community, that is a community that provides meaning to the individual. Rather, for many (if not most) the meaning has already been decided upon and the community is adopted and bought-into as a way of expressing, embodying, or validating one’s self selected meaning. To this end Carl R. Trueman explains that it is not just secular leftists who are radical (expressive) individualists, rather we all are.

The result of this radical individualism seems inevitably to be consumerism. If we are engaging in our world primarily as a way to signify our chosen identity, then nearly everything in our world becomes a product to be purchased to signal who we are. Given the competitive nature of the market place, anything that is a consumer product will find itself in competition with similar products. Consumerism pushes churches into marketing and self-promotion in order to grow and gain congregants as American’s move around the country for work, school, or general wanderlust.

Juvenilization

In this competition for congregants the golden goose is youth. Everyone wants high school and college students around as a sign of vibrancy and the future of the church. They encourage the older folks, recharge the zeal of middle aged attenders, become magnets for other young people, and are looked up to by the kids. So, as ecclesial competition takes place that competition is aimed at sixteen to twenty-four year olds. The result is that much of what the church does is designed to be attractive to young adults. But do young adults, in their relative immaturity, have hearts and minds rightly oriented to be attracted to the right things?

There is a whole history to the juvenilization of the American church. It dates back to the 1950’s with concerns about how kids spent their time while the adults were busy rebuilding the world after two world wars and the Great Depression. It got pressed into overdrive with the political upheaval of the 1960’s and 1970’s. By the time you hit the 1990’s you have churches looking to rejuvenate and they did so by hiring the heirs to those youth movements. Thus youth pastors became the lead pastors, but their ministry did not mature all that much.

Emotionalism and Anti-intellectualism

Marketing to the young and lead by leaders who were suppose to be and reach the young will lead to a juvenilization of music (go check out Dan Kimball’s reflections on worship leaders as theology teachers), preaching, and discipleship content. Juvenilization will result in a promotion of emotionalism and a demotion of intellectual content. Not, mind you, because the young are dumb or unintelligent. Rather because the intellectual level is aimed at them—which means it is not aimed at thirty, forty, fifty (…and so on…) year olds.

Confessionalism?

We could add more, but as noted that is not the only point for the sermon. The main goal is to think theologically about the topic, so what positive theological reflection should be added. As I am known at my church to do, I want to re-tradition and ground my church is something beyond this present cultural moment. But here is a slight problem: I am a pastor in the Evangelical Free Church of America (EFCA), which is explicitly a non-confessional tradition. In the EFCA’s official history Evangelical Heritage, the introduction of the “free” notion is described as “a fierce application of the sola scripture principle” and “promote freedom in church order, emphasizing the purity and simplicity of the early church” (Evangelical Heritage, 24). While this is supposed to read as a dogged commitment to biblical fidelity—which in some ways it is—I read it as a rejection of theological thinking in favor of “where stands it literally written” church order.

Now it does not need to mean that. In fact, an openness or freeness doctrinally can be a sign of rigorous theological thinking resulting in thoughtful delineation of theological debates and topics within a theological triage that enables a well versed theologian to be comfortable with a variety of theological disagreements as long as there is agreement on the tier of theological triage any disagreement fits in. However, my experience within the EFCA is that it is often either theology-lite or theological mutt.

In a theology lite context, we might not really recognize the differences and acknowledge the importance of theological debates. This is sort of the Calvinism-Arminianism debate posture that assumes “aren’t they both right” and jokes about being predestined to not care. On that particular issue the answer is “no” they cannot both be right. Jacobus Arminius was teaching contrary to Calvinism at a Calvinist seminary. This was acknowledged and addressed by the faculty of the school. His followers articulated what they thought to be five key points that he was in disagreement with Calvinist teaching and the Synod of Dort ultimately produced five points of Calvinism (which are not meant to be the totality or the sum of Calvinism, but merely responses to Arminius’s followers) in response. Thus the five points of Calvinism and the five points of Arminianism are designed to be mutually exclusive. More to the point, what people mean by the “aren’t they both true” approach is that Calvinists affirm God’s sovereignty and Arminians affirm human freedom, and the Bible teaches both—so aren’t they both true? Well, yes if it were that simple. But that is not what the Calvinism-Arminianism debate is about. Calvin affirmed free will. Arminius struggled to understand how they functioned together so he developed a mechanism by which they could cooperate. The debate is over the mechanism.

In the theological mutt contexts what you get is the expression of theological freedom but an objectively positive posture toward certain theological positions that are often unstated. So you might be told that we do not debate eschatology, which simply means we accept the current pastor’s theological position on eschatology. This leads to a congregation that are theological mutts, muddled with all sorts of incompatible positions. They are dispensationalists, who read the Bible typologically, and do baby dedications, while affirming Calvinistic sovereignty and coventalism.

So what?

We need to be more theological. We need to think as actual Christians about these subjects. Which means we need to approach the church with an openness to find our preferences refuted or at least challenged. Maybe music shouldn’t necessarily sound like we think it should. Maybe preaching and a good message are something other than we think they are. Maybe family is kind of socially awkward. When we think about the church theologically we realize how important commitment is to it.

I do not hear church hopping condemned as much as I use to but maybe I am not in the right circles for that anymore. But reading through the New Testament and seeing the theological comments made about the church I am struck by how egregious church hopping is.

Acts 2:42–47

[42] And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. [43] And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. [44] And all who believed were together and had all things in common. [45] And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. [46] And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, [47] praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved. (ESV)

Ephesians 4:11–16

[11] And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, [12] to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, [13] until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, [14] so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. [15] Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, [16] from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love. (ESV)

Colossians 3:12–17

[12] Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, [13] bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. [14] And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. [15] And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. [16] Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. [17] And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. (ESV)

These texts do not describe the kind of loose communities that churches have become for many in American Evangelicalism. Rather these sound to me like robust spiritually maturing families committed to God’s word and one another because of the unity of the Spirit.

Spiritual Formation and the Local Church

I have been thinking about spiritual formation and the local church recently. It started with a Mere Fidelity podcast on disagreements in the church and when one should leave the church or whether he should stay. I think this podcast followed all the Matthew Barrett hubbub. I was interested to hear that with the exception of the PCA, who jokes about outsourcing much of his theological reflection to the Westminster Standards, all the others in the conversation have significant disagreements with their church, but find the local church family to be so important to their walk with Christ that they subordinate views of baptism or Calvinism or what-have-you to being known in the church. That is how important the local church is as a family, not merely an event or social club, but as an actual family, that professional theologians subordinate what are usually classified as second-tier theological issues to it. I found that interesting as I have experienced and have heard the stories of people leaving the church because:

• Reformed theology

• Not reformed theology enough!

• Not dispensationalist

• Not explicitly seven day creationist

• Possible disagreement on deistic evolution

• Politics

Looking over Ephesians and Colossians and wondering how the church forms us I am struck I think we have a mechanistic vision for spiritual formation in the church. We think we are matured through listening to sermons, but the text does not say that. It does say that the church is given preachers, but also a host of other gifts. Listening to sermons is important, but Colossians specifically mentions singing with one another. The maturing power of these gifts is obviously coming through the Holy Spirit, but on a human level it has to do with whether or not love is the aim.

I have much more I am working out in my head, but I need to go write my actual sermon now.

Knocked out a few books on my reading just adding to it, need to organize some of my projects and see what I should be reading in the Fall:

• The Feast by Margaret Kennedy

• 40 Questions about Pastoral Ministry by Phil A. Newton

I have taken an extended break from this book, probably have to completely review it when I go to pick it back up again.

• Advanced Strategic Planning by Aubry Malphrus

Interesting for a while, followed by over a hundred pages of tediousness.

• Vida Completiva by Beyung-Chul Han

• The Dignity of Dependance by Leah Limbresco Sargent

• Thinking in Circles by Mary Douglas

• Communion with God by John Owen (Puritan Paperback edition)

• Sexy by Jeff Mallinson

Interesting idea. In fact, the subtitle is very close to a writing project I am working on and pitching. However, the execution falls short. Maybe the biggest reason is this guy needed an editor to chop significant chunks out. The adage in writing is “kill your darlings,” well he couldn’t bring himself to do it. Along with that, the book reads a bit like Mallinson is going for an Augustinian vibe and writing a book that is itself a journey. Which is fine, in fact it’s an admirable concept. But this felt like a meandering road trip where the destination may not have been predetermined and the stops along the way were more of the world’s largest artichoke variety than the Grand Canyon. Finally, Mallinson seems to be trying very hard to be Californian in this book. There is a lot of forced language that sounds like a dude who doesn’t want his PhD to make the hippies think he is too buttoned up... I mean, “surfing the Tao,” come on dude.

Two things of interest for a reader a decade after the book was published. I looked the author up and it seems he and his wife deconstructed and reconverted the Christian faith. That is rough and there are some parts of the book that might have been foreshadowing of struggles in the faith. Second, Mallinson talks quite a bit about his family, at one point out of curiosity I googled if his son got married to the girl mentioned in one of the chapters and came across the conversation about his son’s death in his mid-twenties. Not sure the story of if it is connected with the deconversion, but the decade since publication must have been rough. Praying for healing and return.

• The Church by Brad East

• The Juvenilization of American Christianity by Thomas E. Bergler

I didn’t read this whole book, I skipped chapters on Roman Catholicism and traditions that were not relevant to my study. What I read was very accessible and well argued.

• Evangelical Heritage by David Gustafson

Becoming God’s Family by Carmen Joy Imes

As I wrap up, I can’t help but think about the relationship of virtue and the local church. What does our church family contribute to our spiritual maturity by way of virtue formation?

Thanks for reading,

tdh

Hey,

Welcome to The Musings of Tyler Hurst where I look at issues surrounding church, culture, and technology through Christian theology, Christian philosophy, and Christian ethics. As a pastor and student of spiritual formation, public (political) theology, and ethics these are important issues to me and their intersection often is missed.

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoy the thoughts,

tdh

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In this post I want to problematize and represent much of what I see in Evangelical sexual ethics. The goal is to find an intellectually honest, spiritually coherent, and practically applicable vision for conducting ourselves as sexual beings. But first, here are five things that caught my eye:

1. Brad East reviews Walter Brueggemann’s final book - Over at Christianity Today, Brad East has reviewed liberal theologian Walter Brueggemann’s final book. Brueggemann died last year at age ninty-two. East writes of Brueggemann that he “was God-haunted, God-saturated, God-obsessed. He couldn’t go more than a few sentences without talking about God, so enamored was he with the sheer reality and weight of God. Before long, you’re swept up in his passion—that is, until he sideswipes you with what this God demands: everything.” Brueggemann was a heavy weight in certain theological circles and for that reason he is worth thinking about. However, according to East, he falls into the trap of many impassioned thought leaders “Like many liberals, Brueggemann is convinced that if you just learn enough about economics, you’ll inevitably come to agree with a general left-of-center consensus on two things: that capitalism is a fundamental problem afflicting the world’s poor and that there is a ready-made alternative, if only we had the political will to implement it. But this is not true. Regardless of whether liberals are right about capitalism, it is not true that anyone sufficiently informed about economics will become a liberal.”

2. Crisis of Responsibility - Jonah Goldberg has some interesting observations about the crisis of responsibility in politics. We do not have the courage to do hard things anymore, and in politics one of the hardest things is calling balls and strikes on your own side.

3. Rural Pastors and Godly Ambition - I am still mulling over the topic of pastoral “leadership.” Is leadership an appropriate word or concept for the church? If so is there a model or school of thought that the Bible provides? How do pastors and elders fulfill their responsibility without adopting and embodying worldly modes of leadership? Some further food for thought for me has come from Common Good, “a magazine for all of life.” The cover essay for the magazine is from a pastor of a rural church. The author is a rural pastor who interviewed two other rural pastors and gives a few reflections.

4. A Primer on Post-(Theological) Liberalism with a Thesis - The guys at Mere Fidelity followed up what I thought to be a lack luster podcast on masculinity with a fascinating discussion on post-liberal theology sparked by the an article at The Protestant Mind by Dale Coulter. Occasionally (now 3/4s of a year after finishing my PhD), I wonder if I pursued something too parochial. It is worthless to re-litigate the past and the decisions—in fact I stand by my choice of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary at the end of the day. But occasionally I wonder about dipping my toe in waters more diverse than I did. This essay on post-liberal theology is an interesting addition to that reflection.

5. James K.A. Smith and When the Stream Flows the Wrong Way - This article at Comment caught my eye. It is essentially an excerpt from James (Jamie) K.A. Smith’s most recent book. Was reviewed at the Gospel Coalition with, as I understand it, the conclusion that Smith is slipping away from anything mooring him to the ancient faith and Augustinian theology that his early work marked him out as Christian thinker. It is hard not to notice that the point at which Smith began to drift away is more related to politics than any other event. Many are familiar with the adage that politics is downstream from culture. Well, Christians must have politics downstream of faith—for Smith it seems that his political disappointment and discontent has destabilized his faith.

I have been struck of late about the general paucity of Christian sexual ethics among lay Christians.

• The existence of Christian surrogacy agencies;

• Rise in number of premarital sexual partners among evangelicals;

• Not only is pornography still a problem, it now has the benefit of moral ambiguity for young people. We have yet to see the full weight of how A.I. will play affect porn.

We can add to these:

• Increasing acceptance of artificial reproductive technologies including in vitro fertilization;

• Increasing use of abortive or potentially abortive birth control including inter uterine devices and “the pill.”

I am honestly not sure what the problem is here. My junior high, high school, and college experience were all marked by what I would now consider a slight over emphasis on sexual ethics. I am curious if the rise and fall of purity culture has a subsequent rise and fall of evangelical youth group “sex talks.”

To be honest, though, it is not really the youngsters I am worried about—though I do want age appropriate sexual ethic discussions with teenagers. The issue is full spectrum. Millennials pursuing egg freezing or IVF, Gen X’ers and Boomers having premarital sex on their second go round after the death of a spouse. A year ago I even had an older woman (late-seventies or early eighties) ask if I would officiate a wedding for her and her boyfriend in their retirement community—a brief conversation lead to revelation that they have been “sleeping together” and that both families disapproved of the relationship.

Do We Just Need to Do Better?

There is part of me with the instinctual reaction that we just need to do better, we need to be clear about what we do and don’t believe about sex, sexuality, and sexual purity. But the more I have reflected on these issues the more I question the common approaches to sexual ethics. As a millennial, I think about Purity culture, Every Man’s Battle, and the youth pastor phenomenon of the “Smoking Hot Wife.” In each of these, and in many of the Christian ethics books I have, the approach to sexual ethics was something of a principles first description and often a principles first modified by a worldly lens. So it was often some version of:

1. God designed sex for marriage and to be pleasurable;

2. Sex outside of marriage is wrong—and also studies show less pleasurable;

3. Inside marriage sex should be “free, frequent, and fun” (read: pleasurable);

Occasionally, more intellectual discussion might draw on some Catholic social ethics, such as John Paul II’s Man and Woman He Created Them: A Theology of the Body. This often brought in some natural law and creation order principles such as:

• Procreation as intrinsic to God’s design for sex;

• Sexual activity is not primarily for pleasure, but unity—so proper sexual activity is judge by the unitive principle.

I want to give a tempered “amen” to much of this. I think it is also time that evangelicals questioned this approach to ecclesial sex education generally. It has a decidedly one-dimensional feel to it.

So What Do We Do Instead?

In my academic work I have criticized evangelical ethics for being reductionistic and merely biblical. In my dissertation I write:

I employ theological ethics, virtue ethics, natural law ethics, and public theology. These approaches to ethical deliberation offer deeper analysis than the typical evangelical approach to IVF and other bioethical issues. The standard approach to IVF can be classified as evangelical ethical minimalism, which sees evangelical ethics primarily in terms of a strict analysis of biblical texts and pro-life activism…This approach is inadequate for the novel issues of contemporary bioethics.

When I write “a strict analysis of biblical texts,” I am referring to what is called “biblical ethics.” It is important to recognize that the word “biblical” is functioning differently than it does in common parlance. In every day speech a Christian might say that they want a more biblical church and what they mean is that a church whose teaching, ministries, structures, and official doctrine corresponds with the teaching of the Bible. But in Christian ethics we take as a given the desire to be biblical in that sense. Rather, what biblical ethics is doing is analyzing the biblical text for clear ethical teachings. Biblical ethics, then, is just one tool in the tool box of the Christian seeking to do ethics. Also in that tool box is, as the quote from my dissertation shows:

• Theological ethics: where ethical principles are derived from reflection and study of systematic theology;

• Virtue ethics: the right and wrong actions are derived from thinking about the kind of people and the character traits we are suppose to have

• Natural law ethics: ethical principles are derived from understanding the construction of the world, we develop our moral ‘oughts’ from our real ‘ises;’

We will leave public theology for another time. Suffice to say that a merely biblical ethics approach leaves three important tools unused on an issue of critical importance. Particularly I think we need more virtue ethics in our evangelical sexual ethics—in fact, we need more virtue in our evangelicalism broadly.

What Does Virtue Ethics Say About Sex?

Honestly, I think we need more natural law and theological ethics in our discussions about sex also, but I specifically mention virtue ethics because it is oddly overlooked. Catholics carved out important ground on sex and natural law and evangelicals like Andrew T. Walker have been looking at how to develop an evangelical vision of natural law. Theological ethics was a more British and European model for looking at ethics and as more evangelicals study at Oxford, Cambridge, Saint Andrews, and Aberdeen we are seeing more theological ethics. For example, Matthew Lee Anderson. But virtue has been left out of the discussion in a perplexing manner. In fact, I have one book on sexual ethics that takes a virtue approach, and when looking up the author recently, I discover that he has de-converted the Christian faith. So that book, while interesting is basically useless as a reference.

I would argue that the New Testament’s default register in discussing ethics is virtue and its primary test case is sex. For example:

Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints. (Ephesians 5:1-2)

If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these the wrath of God is coming. (Colossians 3:1–6)

Finally, then, brothers, we ask and urge you in the Lord Jesus, that as you received from us how you ought to walk and to please God, just as you are doing, that you do so more and more. For you know what instructions we gave you through the Lord Jesus. For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality; that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, not in the passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God; that no one transgress and wrong his brother in this matter, because the Lord is an avenger in all these things, as we told you beforehand and solemnly warned you. For God has not called us for impurity, but in holiness. Therefore whoever disregards this, disregards not man but God, who gives his Holy Spirit to you. (1 Thessalonians 4:1–8)

Paul does not run to divine command theory (deontological moral theory) or consequentialist arguments, he states that Christians are to be a certain kind of person—to have a character modeled on God or Christ. And Paul concludes from this observation that sexual immorality must be purged from the hearts and life of Christians.

These are still general statements, however, if we were to be more specific, we could look to the fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5:

But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

Notice again that sexual sin marks the flesh. Rather than Christians indulging in sexual sin, we ought to be people bearing the fruit of the Spirit—which though not specifically unpacked here, is the character of Christ.

As we look at that list (love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control) I think we can draw reasonable conclusions about what appropriate and inappropriate sexual behavior is among Christians.

Can we still talk about abortion and pre-marital sex?

I think some, life John S. and Paul D. Feinberg, worry that discussions of virtue are impractical and tenuous foundation for ethics:

Some may wonder why we don’t espouse some form of virtue ethics. Though we believe, for example, that the fruits of the Spirit are virtues that everyone should pursue, our theory about what makes an act morally good or bad is not that of virtue ethics. There are two main reasons for this. First, virtue ethics focus more on the moral character of the agent than on the moral nature of the act, so they don’t seem to offer an answer that actually addresses the question of the morality of an act. A second concern is that we wonder how virtue ethicists know what the virtues are. Proponents of virtue ethics may answer that one knows what the virtues are when one sees them in action. But here the problem is still that one wants to know what it is about those acts that makes them virtuous.

I find this to be odd refutation. First because the push back on virtue as being about the agent rather than the action seems to me to be the posture of the New Testament. Actions are regularly condemned, but they are condemned as being unChristian, which is to say un-Christ-like. So we have a moral exemplar that moral agents are suppose to model their lives after. Second, they ask how we know what the virtues are after stating that they believe the fruit of the Spirit are virtues… so maybe we figure them out by looking at what the Bible says are virtues. At the end of the day it seems that the worry is we cannot say that premarital sex and abortion are wrong. But I think that is equally odd.

Consider love for example. If you know one biblical Greek word, there is a good chance it is agape, generally defined as self-sacrificing love. Jesus says in John 15:12-13 “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.” And Paul writes, “Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends” (1 Corinthians 13:8). Now think about abortion. Is abortion marked by a laying down of one’s life for another? No, quite the opposite. It is the taking of a life for personal benefit. Is abortion marked by a bearing, believing, hoping, and enduring all things for another? No, many who get abortions express a strong belief in the problematic nature of having another* child and express concern about how that will up end their/her life. In this way, abortion is a rejection of a biblical picture of love not the embrace of it. It is self-love.

What about pre-marital sex? Sex is clearly designed by God as an activity exclusive to marital union. Sex is only positively mentioned in the Bible within marriage covenant. When Paul considers those who burn with passion he instructs “But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband” (1 Corinthians 7:2). This clearly teaches that the Christian expectation is that sex is reserved for being in marriage. But can virtue answer that question? Yes, self-control is a virtue and as noted Paul teaches “For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality; that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor.” A lack of self-control will lead to sexual immorality.

But What Is the Benefit of Virtue Theory?

At this point I imagine the question is something akin to what makes virtue theory important if it get us to the same place as normal biblical ethics? I would say that it does much more than that, but in regard to sex, it gives us the ability to discuss sexual ethics by proxy at a younger age. In other words, we can prepare children and adolescence for the sexual ethics discussion by discussing virtue. Some parents might think it inappropriate to talk about sex with a six year old, but it is not inappropriate to talk about love and self-control.

I would like to develop this further, but have to wrap up.

I have not wrapped up much of my reading just adding to it:

• The Feast by Margaret Kennedy

• 40 Questions about Pastoral Ministry by Phil A. Newton

• Advanced Strategic Planning by Aubry Malphrus

• A Son to Me by Peter Leithart

• Vida Completiva by Beyung-Chul Han

• The Dignity of Dependance by Leah Limbers Sargent

• The Genesis of Gender by Abigale Flavale

• Thinking in Circles by Mary Douglas

• Communion with God by John Owen (Puritan Paperback edition)

• Sexy by Jeff Mallinson

• The Church by Brad East

• The Juvenilization of American Christianity by Thomas E. Bergler

There is a connection here with my prior newsletters, namely, what are the virtues that should mark Christian leadership—whatever it may end up being. This is something I would like to come back to as I solidify my understanding of leadership.

Thanks for reading,

tdh

Hey,

Welcome to The Musings of Tyler Hurst where I look at issues surrounding church, culture, and technology through Christian theology, Christian philosophy, and Christian ethics. As a pastor and student of spiritual formation, public (political) theology, and ethics these are important issues to me and their intersection often is missed.

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoy the thoughts,

tdh

In this newsletter I want to continue my reflection from Newsletter 100 on pastoral ministry, particularly thinking about Christian leadership. I concluded that newsletter writing “Assume, for now, that the pastor is a or the leader of a local church. What does he lead? A family. What is his role? Promote health and maturity in the family, one could assume.” But does the Bible describe this task as “leadership”? That is the question I have. But first, here are five things that stood out to me this week:

1. Ryan Burge has interesting data on religiosity and college majors - Burge is a sociologist with a niche carved out to look at religion and politics. His books have been pretty interesting and I recommend picking them up. But to dip your toe into his work, you can check out this Substack Graphs About Religion. He has a recent post that is pretty interesting going over the data on religion and college majors. Some of this may be surprising if you don’t account for non-Christian religions. I will be thinking about this and what it means for my local university (University of Arizona).

   

2. Is social conservatism stronger now? - Andrew T. Walker, my former Ph.D. advisor, has an article over at Public Discourse about social conservatism holding a stronger position now than twenty years ago. I sincerely wonder about whether this is true as the cultural moment seems extraordinarily swingy. Walker is recognizes this and notes: “there are genuine reasons for optimism about social conservatism today, unlike in decades past. At the same time, the movement faces deep obstacles that will make any lasting renewal difficult and contested. The moment is more promising than many realize. It is also more fragile.” In a sense, we might be strong, but we could easily find ourselves back in a position of weakness or on the defensive. Plus, as Walker admits his view is not supported by “the metrics I would prefer—a higher marriage rate, fewer divorces, outlawed abortion, higher church attendance all around.” I’ll have to think about this, but Walker is an unlikely be the prophet calling “peace, peace” in relation to the broader culture war.

3. AOC promotes egg freezing - First Things has an article from Emma Waters that covers Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s “egg-freezing journey.” I am of two minds about this article. My first thought was to wonder about the level of social influence AOC has. Obviously there must be some fairly high level as I can reasonably expect readers to know who she is by simply referring to her initials. If she has a kind of cultural cache that would be on par with other celebrities (Lebron or Taylor Swift) this may result in more egg freezing—which I view as pointing toward a problematic futures. As Waters notes “while egg freezing does not bear the same moral weight as IVF, it is important to keep in mind that the decision to freeze one’s eggs involves a later decision to use IVF, where human embryos are routinely made in surplus, ranked, screened, stored, and discarded.” My second thought on the article was to think about the fact that motherhood wins. There is a version of feminism that rejects the teleological ordering of the body for procreation, but AOC and younger progressives are not of that stream of thought. They want to be girl-bosses AND they do not want to sacrifice motherhood. Maybe Walker (see #2) is right.

4. A surrogate wins her case to not abort - Sticking with the wild Wild West of reproductive technology. A surrogate recently defended her right not to abort a child with a heart defect and won. This is good-ish news. It is good because it is a defense of life, but it is another story that reveals the morally fraught landscape of modern reproductive technologies. We have opened Pandora’s box with egg freezing, IVF, surrogacy, sperm donations, etc. Can we close it?

5. Autism in the church - Logos Bible Software’s blog has an article about why autistic people are not well represented in the church. As a pastor at a church with an adult disability ministry I found it to be an interesting read. I found this part in particular especially important for generative thinking: “The exact reasons why we are less likely to be Christian are complicated and would take an entire book to litigate. But the summary is this: The necessary work of translating Christian ideas into forms that autistic people can more readily grasp has often not been done…Consider the distinction many Christians draw between ‘head knowledge’ and ‘heart knowledge.’ In many Christian circles, intellectual knowledge is seen as ‘nice to have,’ while the truest expression of the Christian faith is associated with the ‘heart.’ This poses a fundamental distinction that most autistic Christians simply do not make and often do not understand. For many of us, systematized analysis and intellectual rigor are our heart language, the mother tongue to which we most naturally respond.”

On Sunday I was suppose to preach a sermon on what it means to be male and female. Really, however, I preached a sermon on the nature of male-headship in Genesis 1-4. It turns out it is really hard to say what the Bible says about men and women independently from relationship and community, and particularly the relationship and community of the family formed around marriage. So much of my reading and preparation for the sermon ended up back at marriage one way or another. So I had the feeling that I would need to engage with some new material on the whole complementarianism and egalitarianism debate at some point.

As I was doing my preparation, then, I eventually picked up Preston Sprinkle’s latest book From Genesis to Junia: An Honest Search for What the Bible Really Says About Women in Leadership. Over the course of the book Sprinkle is tracking his own evolution from a default complementation perspective to an egalitarian viewpoint. I found the book unconvincing for a number of reasons, but the most curious thing about the book dawned on me around chapter four: what does he mean by leadership? When I first started I either had not really noticed the subtitle of the book or had assumed I knew what it meant by leadership. But as Sprinkle progressed through his investigations, the evidence, and his reflections I realized that leadership—in Sprinkle’s mind—was a general catch all term approximating something like “having influence.”

Let’s stop the tape on Sprinkle there since I have not finished the book. My reason for mentioning it is that my frustration and confusion about the project led to some generative thought as I worked out my sermon. Namely, I began to wonder what Christian leadership (if there is such a thing) would be.

Is Leadership the Right Category?

Occasionally people think I am intelligent because I ask a lot of questions about the categories we employ in various theological debates or about the terms of the debate itself. This is not me being intelligent so much as having been wrong a lot in the past and realizing that one of the reasons I was wrong so frequently is that I did not question the categories or the terms of the debate. So now that is where I often begin. So, when I was reading Sprinkle and having the predominant thought that his focus was so broad as unhelpfully muddy the waters I began to think is the concept of leadership really the right category?

Servant Leadership

When Christians talk about leadership we often use the phrase “servant leadership.” Which makes sense given the model of Christ, the teachings of Paul, and the call of discipleship. But we should take a moment to note that the word “servant” and the word “leader” are almost definitionally antonyms—so what does it mean to put them together?

The primary biblical reference I see when looking at this concept is Matthew 20:20–28:

[20] Then the mother of the sons of Zebedee came up to him with her sons, and kneeling before him she asked him for something. [21] And he said to her, “What do you want?” She said to him, “Say that these two sons of mine are to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your kingdom.” [22] Jesus answered, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I am to drink?” They said to him, “We are able.” [23] He said to them, “You will drink my cup, but to sit at my right hand and at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared by my Father.” [24] And when the ten heard it, they were indignant at the two brothers. [25] But Jesus called them to him and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. [26] It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, [27] and whoever would be first among you must be your slave, [28] even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

There are numerous conclusions we could draw about servant leadership from this text:

• The gentle chastisement of this passage is instruction not to grasp at leadership,

• The reference to the cup and the clear statement of giving one’s life means that the servant leader seeks the good of others,

• There is clear instruction that authority ought not be yielded in a worldly manner.

But if we run to those observations, we miss a few things—most importantly that Christ does not affirm the concept of leadership, but of greatness. I do not immediately assume that these are the same thing. Closely associated with that, notice what Jesus actually says:

• If you want to be great be a servant.

• If you would put yourself first you must be a slave.

He does not say anything to the effect of “Christian leaders will lead by serving.” Leadership language is foreign to this text. It reads to me like a prescription for spiritual formation not a playbook for leadership. In effect, I see Jesus saying something like “it is not good that you want to rule (note the kingdom language of the request), you ought to make yourself a servant (i.e. humble yourself).

What About Shepherd Leadership?

Shepherd leadership presents a better construct to understand Christian leadership, though it is often dismissed because of an unbiblical bifurcation between leading and shepherding. For example, earlier in the year I dusted off an old essay by Timothy Keller—Mark Dever says it is probably Keller’s most widely read work—titled “Leadership and Church Size Dynamics.” In it Keller writes of small church pastors:

The pastor is often a “tentmaker” and does church ministry part time, though once a church has at least ten families who tithe, it can support a full-time minister. The minister’s main job is shepherding, not leading or preaching.

Notice that Keller sees “shepherding” as a different task than leading—and a seemingly mutually exclusive one at that. Keller is simply wrong on this point.

In the letter titled 1 Peter, the disciple who seems to have held a position like “chairman” or “spokesman” for the Twelve, as well as being the central leader of the early church from Acts 2-10, Peter writes:

So I exhort the elders (Grk: Presbyterio, trans: presbyter), among you, as a fellow elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, as well as a partaker in the glory that is going to be revealed: shepherd (Lat trans: pastor) the flock of God that is among you, exercising oversight (Grk: episkopountes, trans: episcopal or bishop), not under compulsion, but willingly, as God would have you; not for shameful gain, but eagerly; not domineering over those in your charge, but being examples to the flock. And when the chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the unfading crown of glory. (1 Peter 5:1-4)

Peter, presumably speaking to small church elders, tells them to shepherd, literally to pastor, by exercising oversight. So a part of pastoral ministry, regardless of church size, is oversight. This would not have been a novel idea to the early Christians as the very metaphor of pastoring was associated with oversight. Timothy S. Laniak has an excellent study on shepherding in the Ancient Near East and the Bible titled Shepherds After My Own Heart. In it he explains the metaphor has in view a “robust, comprehensive shepherding leadership, characterized as much by the judicious use of authority as by sympathetic expression of compassion” (Laniak, 21). Additionally, he notes that the shepherding imagery invokes “a constant state of negotiation with an unpredictable physical and social environment” (Laniak, 57).

What is Oversight? Same as Leadership?

I can not just make the jump from 1 Peter 5 to modern leadership conceptions though. What does Peter mean “exercising oversight.” Is that the same thing as what we call “leadership”? Specifically the word translated oversight means to “look after,” “give attention to,” or “take responsibility for.” Those are all certainly a part of modern notions of leadership, but—if I can say it this way—less ambitious. This form of the word is only used one other time in Scripture:

See (Grk: episkopountes) to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God; that no “root of bitterness” springs up and causes trouble, and by it many become defiled… (Hebrews 12:15)

This, notably, is not addressed to leaders. Nor do Bible translators take it to be a term of leadership but of mutual congregational discipling. We collectively are to take responsibility for the maturity and growth of those in our church. While the term does appear to denote role in the church (Acts 20:28, Philippians 1:1, 1 Timothy 3:2, Titus 1:7, 1 Peter 2:25) it does not necessarily mean something like “lead” as we think of it in the modern world.

Maybe it would be helpful to look elsewhere for leadership? For example Romans 12:

For as in one body we have many members, and the members do not all have the same function, so we, though many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another. Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them: if prophecy, in proportion to our faith; if service, in our serving; the one who teaches, in his teaching; the one who exhorts, in his exhortation; the one who contributes, in generosity; the one who leads, with zeal; the one who does acts of mercy, with cheerfulness. (Romans 12:4-8)

This really is fascinating. The word “leads” here has two main definitions:

1. To exercise a position of leadership, rule, direct, be at the head,

2. To have an interest in, show concern for, care for, give aid.

These are standard was to translate apart from context. Now this word appears eight times in the New Testament—always in Pauline texts and almost always in the pastoral epistles:

We ask you, brothers, to respect those who labor among you and are over you in the Lord and admonish you, and to esteem them very highly in love because of their work. (1 Thessalonians 5:12-13)

Here it is translated “are over” and the instruction is to esteem or respect them in love because of their work. So there are those laboring/working in some position deserving respect. I am working hard to avoid authority language as that might not be the best way to understand the concept of “over” here. It may corrospond to notions of headship—which may have authority in it, but is more about representation and responsibility.

Writing about elders and deacons, Paul writes in 1 Timothy:

He must manage his own household well, with all dignity keeping his children submissive, for if someone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he care for God’s church?

Let deacons each be the husband of one wife, managing their children and their own households well.

1 Timothy 3:4-5, 12

And Paul adds later in the letter:

Let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in preaching and teaching. (1 Timothy 5:17)

While Paul writes much the same instructions to Titus, this particular Greek word does not appear in the qualifications for elders, but in general instructions toward the end of the letter:

⁸ The saying is trustworthy, and I want you to insist on these things, so that those who have believed in God may be careful to devote themselves to good works.

¹⁴ And let our people learn to devote themselves to good works, so as to help cases of urgent need, and not be unfruitful.

Titus 3:8 & 14

In these texts we have three different translations:

• Managing

• Ruling

• Devoting

What I find interesting is much leadership literature will bifurcate leadership from management, but that division does not appear to be carefully delineated by biblical authors and translators.

Where Are We At?

When I think about leadership…

• I think about going somewhere with a group following where you are going;

• I think about direction and vision, again ‘where are we going?’ and also ‘can you see/find your way there?’;

• I am thinking, then, about movement, orientation, pacing;

• I am thinking as well about inspiring, directing, and instructing.

Thus far, I have not seen that in Scripture. I see:

• Management,

• Taking responsibility,

• Looking after.

I am on the fence as to whether or not “leadership” is the right word for this—maybe it is best to stick to “shepherding.”

Working on some major future planning and I finished A Son to Me by Peter Liehart. Really enjoyed it and look forward to picking it back up in a few years when I actually get around to preaching through 1 and 2 Samuel. Here are some other things I have been reading:

• The Feast by Margaret Kennedy

• 40 Questions about Pastoral Ministry by Phil A. Newton

• Advanced Strategic Planning by Aubry Malphrus

• A Son to Me by Peter Leithart

• Vida Completiva by Beyung-Chul Han

• The Dignity of Dependance by Leah Limbers Sargent

• The Genesis of Gender by Abigale Flavale

• Thinking in Circles by Mary Douglas

Why am I spending so much time thinking about leadership. I mean the honest and easy answer is that I am increasingly concerned about the fact that I will be the “lead” pastor of my church on January 1st 2027. In addition, I am thinking about virtue a lot these days. What virtues are particularly necessary to lead?… Or, like I said, to shepherd? Are they different?

Food for thought.

Thanks for reading,

tdh

Hey,

Welcome to The Musings of Tyler Hurst where I look at issues surrounding church, culture, and technology through Christian theology, Christian philosophy, and Christian ethics. As a pastor and student of spiritual formation, public (political) theology, and ethics these are important issues to me and their intersection often is missed.

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoy the thoughts,

tdh

In this newsletter I want to spend some time thinking about the goal of pastoral ministry. What is it? And how do we know that? But first, here are five things that have stood out to me this week:

1. Is Doug Wilson really this bad? - Over at The Dispatch there is an article by Hannah Anderson, an author I am big fan of, arguing that Wilson is problematic figure, but that the issue with his influence is overlooked because he advances startling positions (revoking women’s suffrage and empathy being a sin) with an affect that makes them seem less problematic. A few things I will say about this. (1) I think the article is interesting. (2) Wilson says a lot of crazy things, he also says a lot of things that are not that crazy, but people are afraid to say. (3) I personally know one individual whose marriage struggled because of his involvement with Wilson’s ministry—but I know a lot of people, so I wonder about one of the premises of this piece. I am a “jury is still out” guy when it comes to Wilson. I hear troubling things, but I am not sure how to take them at this point.

2. Is there a right wing gaze? - While working on my PhD, my advisor was Dr. Andrew T. Walker and he has a piece at WORLD.com that argues for caution among evangelicals (I presume) and conservative politicians (cough, couch, J., cough, D. Vance, cough, cough) who might be influenced by a right wing influencer culture to the detriment of core conservative issues. As the Republican Party prepares for life after President Donald J. Trump is off the ballot, there is a question of which factions within the party will gain more ground. Walker’s worry and warning is to not give in to the edge-lords of the internet. They are not conservatives, their presence in the Republican Party is merely negative polarization against the Democratic Party’s take over by “woke” socialists. The reason Walker’s argument is important is that a Republican Party overtaken by internet edge-lords leaves no safe harbor for Christian’s in politics or in the voting booth.

3. Habits have power, but is it spiritual power? - I am still ruminating on this one. The emphasis of this article is on the, as the title suggests, the power of habit; and habits do have power. But when we think about habits from a Christian perspective, a habit can only produce sanctification when it is yielded by the Spirit against our flesh. The author gives a hint at this when pointing out that Augustine is converted by God and given by God a new will. But he goes right back to the notion of habit writing “We shouldn’t discount the supernatural consequences of natural habits in our lives… Our lives are a collection of a million, billion little decisions—most of which seem fairly inconsequential. But when we scoop them all together, we find a particular shape and pattern. And those decisions (and habits) bear influence on our spiritual lives.” There is a truth here, but I wonder if it is out of balance, or if the vocabulary is wrong—the natural man, biblically speaking, is counterposed to the spiritual man, so maybe that is it. Still thinking about it.

4. Why do people love The Odyssey so much? - I’ll say, I love The Odyssey. I read parts of it, or maybe an abridged version, in college, but a few years ago I read twelve books involving journeys in chronological order. So The Odyssey was the first and I came back to parts of it over and over again that year and since. It along with Dante’s Divine Comedy have loomed large in my imagination since then. But I don’t pay a ton of attention to media—I don’t own a TV or streaming service—so I have been taken aback by the focus on The Odyssey film that came out. Directed by Christopher Nolan and starring Matt Damon, sounds like a good watch; but goodness it is everywhere. Why has it captured so much attention?

5. Can you 3D print a church building? - That’s not a theological question, it’s an engineering one. Christianity Today is reporting that a church in Texas is exploring the idea of 3D printing their church building. Apparently it is possible to 3D print buildings generally, so I guess it will work…

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I am writing this on July 31, 2026. Which means there are 153 days in between my writing this newsletter and becoming a lead pastor (some call them senior pastors, but as I’ll turn 39 within a week of assuming the office, ‘senior’ doesn’t feel like the right modifier). Now, I have been in some form of pastoral ministry for a while. When I was in seminary I was a “lay shepherd” at my church, which was a small group leader who acted “as the first line of pastoral ministry). After moving from Southern California and that church to Northern California, I ended up at a church that asked me to take on “leading and filling the pastoral role” for the college and young adults group. After that I joined a church plant for a year and was an associate pastor—first time that was a full time position for me. Then I joined my current church, where I have been the associate pastor since late 2021. This history laid out, everyone I have spoken to says that there is something different about being the lead pastor. For example, my friend and fellow EFCA pastor, Shannon told me that when he moved from being an associate pastor at his church to being the lead pastor of the same church, he was hyperventilating into a paper bag by lunch time. I have heard many such stories. To the point that I have drawn two conclusions:

1. There is something unique about being lead pastor.

2. You don’t know the experience until you’re in it.

It’s possible that these are not true, so let’s call them hypotheses for now. Regardless, it has made me want to reflect on what I think concerning pastoral ministry.

The Church and the Pastor

A little while back I heard an oft repeated phrase, not sure where it originates, but it is something like “the church is the only institution that exists for those outside of it.” I have not the faintest clue why someone would think this if they are reading the Bible. Controversial? Provocative? Maybe, but the logic is pretty simple.

What is the church?

Read the New Testament and ask yourself, “what is the church?” Anyone with a semesters worth of Greek or a good study Bible will tell you the basic linguistics answer: the word we translate church is a common greek word ecclāsia which means gathering or assembly. More specifically the word could be broken down into component parts to say that the church is “the called out ones.” In other words, it is a gathering or assembly of those called out for some purpose or by someone. So it is the gathering or assembly of people called by God for the purposes of God.

Not a bad start, but read a bit further and we are going to get some interpretation as to the nature of that gathering or assembly. We will encounter theological instruction that:

• The church is a family

• The church is a body

• The church is a temple

• The church is Christ’s bride

• The church is a holy nation

• The church is a flock of sheep

• The church is a pillar of the truth

I am going to table the image of bride and the image of the pillar for the primary reason that these seem to me to be more true of what theologians call “the Universal Church” or the “Invisible Church,” than of a local church. Since we are trying to think about the role and ministry of a pastor, the church of all believers at all times seems less relevant.

I think we can also table holy nation as this seems to highlight the notion of the Kingdom of God, something more eschatological than ecclesiological. I also want to table temple for now, and body. Though both of these are more relevant to pastoral ministry than I think gets unpacked in a lot of reflection on the local church.

So we have family and flock. These seem like a good place to start for two basic reasons:

1. A pastor is a shepherd, that is simply what the word means. So the flock image is a clear fit.

2. As the church begins it seems to adopt the role and structure of family with remarkable speed.

Think about the family…

In Acts to the disciples are in the upper room after Jesus’s resurrection trying to figure out what is going on. He tells them to wait for the Holy Spirit. Then, a little while later, they are in (I presume) Solomon’s Portico and the Holy Spirit fills them and they go out causing a stir and preach the gospel. Three thousand convert and they begin meeting together (gathering…churching?) and acting like family immediately.

Here is what I want to say about this, family is a flexible category. It does not need to mean those biologically related to us. We can call a friend a “brother” and our kids can know them as “uncle Such-and-Such. We can adopt children and they become legal family. So it seems to me that this is less a metaphor and more a description. The church literally becomes a family for those who come to Christ. We do not become like family, but actually family.

Let’s go back to the saying “the church is the only institution that exists for those outside of it.” Now substitute family for church, does it make sense? The family is the only institution that exists for those outside of it. Not really, honestly I am not sure what that would even mean.

What if we did the same with flock? The flock is the only institution that exists for those outside of it. Still at a bit of a loss. I mean a flock isn’t really an institution so this doesn’t make sense either.

The Mission of the Church

So why do some people say this? My guess is that it is because of the idea of the mission of the church. Although there is some debate about the scope and nature of the mission of the church. An essay over at The Gospel Coalition covers it from a high view noting:

• Debate about whether the mission of the church is a biblical concept,

• Debate about the relationship between Jesus’s mission, the apostles’ mission, and the church’s mission,

• Debate about the prominence of the Great Comission to the mission of the church,

And, while left out of the article, we could add:

• Debate about what a disciple is.

Additionally, I want to note a personal point of contention with the essay relating to the second point of debate. The author writes:

We could look at almost any chapter in Acts to gain insight into the mission of the church, but Acts 14 is especially instructive, verses 21-23 in particular…This isn’t the first time the gospel is going to be preached to unbelievers in Acts, neither is it the first gospel work Paul and Barnabas will do. But it is the first time we see a church intentionally sending out Christian workers with a mission to another location… The final section in Acts 14 is not only a good summary of Paul’s missionary work, it is the sort of information Paul would have shared with the church in Antioch when he returned (v. 27). These verses are like the PowerPoint presentation Paul and Barnabas shared with their sending church. “This is how we saw God at work. Here’s where we went and what we did.” In other words, if any verses are going to give us a succinct description of what mission was about in the early church, it’s verses like these at the end of Acts 14. Acts 14:21-23 presents us with the three-legged stool of the church’s mission. Through the missionary work of the Apostle Paul, the early church aimed for:

• New converts: “when they had preached the gospel to that city and had made many disciples” (v. 21)

• New communities: “And when they had appointed elders for them in every church” (v. 23)

• Nurtured churches: “strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith” (v. 22).

If the apostles are meant to be the church’s model for mission, then we should expect our missionaries to be engaged in these activities and pray for them to that end. The goal of mission work is to win new converts, establish these young disciples in the faith, and incorporate them into a local church.

Two quibbles that I have with this excerpt, first and most straightforward, there is a one-to-one association between converts and disciples. “The church aimed for new converts” does not say the same thing to me as “the church aimed to make disciples,” which is certainly a larger project than mere conversion. Second, this excerpt is found under the title of “The Mission of the Church in Acts,” yet what is described is a missionary trip commissioned by the church but participated in by merely a few. I want to say that I agree with almost everything in here except the framing that this is the best description of the mission of the church from Acts. I fail to see why this should be more paradigmatic than the section of Acts 2 quotes above.

After the Book of Acts

Let me go back to Acts 2:42-47 for a moment. Assume the apostles knew what they were doing and understood what Jesus told them to do at the end of the gospels, what would Acts 2:42-47 tell us about the Great Comission? Maybe that the Great Comission has something to do with the familial nature of the church. Consider that after the Book of Acts the word disciple will not be used for the rest of the Old Testament. Not by Paul in Romans through Philemon. Not by the author of Hebrews. Not by Peter, James, Jude, or John. Instead the predominant descriptor of Christians after Acts is “Brothers.”

Preliminary Conclusion

I need to wrap this up and get on to other things. So maybe it is best to split this post and give some preliminary conclusions. Assume, for now, that the pastor is a or the leader of a local church.

• What does he lead? A family.

• What is his role? Promote health and maturity in the family, one could assume.

Here is what I want to point out, to understand the goal of pastoral ministry, we have to understand the local church. Theology is a big area of study. As such it is hard to know all the things involved in the study of theology, so seminaries, publishing houses, and pastoral conferences tend to go through various times of thinking and reflecting on certain topics while others fade into the background. We have gone through an era of thinking about theology proper with the concerns of classical theism. We have done through an era of thinking about theological anthropology with the rise of same-sex marriage, transgenderism, and various technologies. It is time for us to think about ecclesiology—it is in fact past time.

I’ll pick up this thread in another post.

I have been horrible at keeping track of my reading lately, but here are the various books I have going right now:

• The Feast by Margaret Kennedy

• 40 Questions about Pastoral Ministry by Phil A. Newton

• Advanced Strategic Planning by Aubry Malphrus

• A Son to Me by Peter Leithart

• Vida Completiva by Beyung-Chul Han

• The Dignity of Dependance by Leah Limbers Sargent

If the church is a family, not metaphorically, but really, then what about the way we “do church” today needs to be reimagined? What about pastoral ministry needs to be rethought? And what should change about seminary education? These are all fascinating questions that will have to wait for another post.

Thanks for reading,

tdh