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I use the word atheist to be provocative. Agnostic might be a better word.

I have an acquaintance who is a closet agnostic, not wanting to disrupt his family and friends. He attends church, sings the hymns, takes communion, but is not at all sure that God exists. He has become settled in this state of mind and heart and only confides in a few individuals—including me, whom he came to know through my book, Walking Away from Faith.

If I know him, why haven’t I argued him back into faith, some would say. I talk about atheism and apologetics in my book and I touch on related issues in an article I wrote in the most recent issue of Mission Frontiers.

People come back to faith most often through their emotions, including music and personal relationships. When someone admits their unbelief, they are regarded as unbelievers—as objects of evangelism—which puts them outside the community of faith.

I defend my acquaintance because I believe he will discover his faith again inside the community of faith—more likely than he would on the outside, hanging out with the atheists.

Two comments come to mind. Madeleine L’Engle who said, With my naked intellect I cannot believe in God. She needed the emotions and community to believe in God. The other comment is from Kathleen Norris who had wandered in unbelief for 20 years: “I came to understand that God hadn’t lost me even if I had seemed for years to have misplaced God.”

So, I defend the closet atheist.

I am working on a manuscript designed to recognize John Calvin’s 500th birthday coming up July 10, 2009. Its a historical and contemporary study of opinions on this most influential man.

As a Reformed Christian, I owe a lot to Old JC, but the honest truth is: I have a love-hate relationship with the man. For the most part, he was a kindly gentleman who did a lot of good things. But he also set the stage for a theological worldview that many people perceive to be far more negative and mean-spirited than the Way of Christ permits.

Now, I know many of you will say that the stage was set by Paul, by Augustine, by Luther and others. But Calvin had a huge role in promoting and disseminating the Calvinist theological worldview.

And, why didnt he step in and stop the burning of Servetus? Sure, he was a man of his times. He lived and died before the Enlightenment. But so did Katherine Zell who raged against those at Geneva who burned the poor Servetus at the stake. Today none of us would give a nod to aid in the burning of a heretic. Its hard to comprehend the mind of one who would. Its hard for many of us to comprehend John Calvin.

So, Im asking you, my readers, to weigh in on this. Do you love him or hate him? I want to collect some wonderfully quotable sentences and paragraphsnot pages of materialthat I can include in my manuscript (with your permission, of course). I would also like you to share any quotes or opinions of him you have from others, particularly historical or contemporary folks whose names wed recognize. Contact relatives and friendsmaybe your pastor or priest. Invite them to weigh in on this controversial topic.

Calvin was anything but a funny guy, but please share any humor that comes to mind. I tried my hand at this in an effort to give a touch of humor to that awful ordeal: sizzling Servetus at the steakwell, medium, or rare? No, I wont stoop that low. Rather, I paraphrase a little nursery rhyme that begins with an allusion to the Heidelberg Catechism that all good Calvinists study from childhood:

Heidel diddle diddle,
The catechism and the Bible
Old Calvin jumped over the flames.
Servetus scowled to see such sport,
Simultaneously dissed and mooned!

Help me out, you all. Give me some good stuff on JC.

I didn’t go to church this morning—one reason: my hair. My stylist has cut back her hours and her openings conflict with my schedule. A STYLIST? You have a stylist? Surely that would be the question for anyone who knows me. But without one, the honest truth is I would normally look a lot worse than I actually do. Now, this is not an issue of a low self image. I’m a realist. I know my strengths. For example, I have good teeth and a good smile. But bad hair always trumps good teeth.

But why shortchange the Lord by not going to church just became of bad hair? (I wish my church had a confessional. I’d go to a priest and pour out my heart.) A few months ago, a man at church, who has made friendly jabs at me regarding my Calvin Seminary situation, poked fun of my hair. He laughed at me. That did it. I stay home for bad hair. There are many people at my church who I’m sure think of me as an uppity woman for exposing the seminary. I can deal with that—any day. I’ll answer any question, show any document. But I’m guilty when it comes to my hair. Had the seminary cast me out due to bad hair, they would have been entirely justified.

Why not wear a hat? I love hats, but until a few more bad-hair ladies join in, a hat will only serve to draw unwanted attention. John says, Just put a bag over you head.

Now that’s a cruel, if not sexist, comment! This morning as I was lamenting my hair, I presented an air-tight case to him on the sexism inherent in hair. He’s seriously balding—-FAR more so than I am. His hair is much thinner and more stringy than mine is, but no one laughs at his hair. He can go to church with his head high while I hunker down alone at home in my misery with only the Sunday paper and shimmering river to keep me company.

Here is the evidence for why I stayed home this morning.

Here is the hair that actually went to church.

Leadership is a hot topic today. Colleges and universities and seminaries and churches and Christian organizations of all varieties are developing leadership programs. I cite my own denomination, the Christian Reformed Church. To celebrate its 150th anniversary, it is raising millions of dollars to launch a leadership institute. My alma mater Baylor University has recently established a school of leadership. The list goes on and on.

I myself jumped on the bandwagon several years ago when I proposed a course on leadership at Calvin Seminary where I was teaching. I would approach the topic from a biblical, historical, and biographical perspectives; seeking to identify role models. It was not until I was teaching through the course a second time that I realized what a crock this whole topic is. It’s phony from beginning to end especially as it relates to biblical models.

That Jesus was a failed leader both by example and by teaching is something we already know at least unconsciously. Jesus taught that the first shall be last; take up your cross and follow me; to be a minister or to be great in the eyes of God is to be a servant. His teaching on leadership was upside-down and backwards. Indeed, it was no leadership teaching at all. We all know that, but we easily try to fix Jesus’ teachings or put the prefix servant in front of the word leadership. But the effort falls short.

It falls short because with Jesus we get a lot more than theory. He modeled his teachings. He was a servant, to be sure. But he was not, I argue, a servant leader.

First, let me seek to define leader or leadership. I’m not breaking any new ground here. I look to others. Malcolm Forbes offers the most basic stock definition: "No one™s a leader if there are no followers.†Peter Drucker agrees: “The only definition of a leader is someone who has followers.â€

Others have emphasized influence. But we all know there are many people of influence – scientists, authors, musicians – who have great influence but are not leaders in any sense of the term. The dictionary examples of a leader are typically conductor, guide, and military officer.

Let’s look at Jesus within the framework of this definition and these examples.

True, Jesus had 12 disciples who were followers. But 12 is a low number by leadership standards, and the followers were fickle at best. One betrayed, one denied, one doubted, the rest hid out. None of the followers have a profile that a conductor, a guide, or military officer would put up with.

As for the leader, Jesus is executed in his early thirties. Not exactly a demonstration of leadership success.

This model of leader/followers is hardly one that would serve today’s leadership seminars. Something is dramatically wrong with the picture. Plain and simple, Jesus was a failed leader though it’s critical to point out that Jesus did not aspire to leadership.

But Jesus has become the ultimate model for many Christian leadership gurus today. Books and websites abound. The Leadership Lessons of Jesus: A Timeless Model for Today’s Leaders by Bob Briner and Ray Pritchard is just one example. Of hundreds of websites one is "58 leadership secrets of Jesus."

Both the secular world and the Christian community have drifted far off course on the matter of leadership. That is the subject of my soon-to-be published book: Leadership Reconsidered. My emphasis in that book is not merely the wrong-headedness of leadership training, but the right emphasis that must take its place that of legacy.

The heart of the gospel and how it relates to us is not that we should follow Jesus who shows us a pattern for leadership. Indeed, leaders are as fickle as are followers. News stories of political and business and religions leaders feature that profile every day of the week. A leader’s star rises as quickly as it falls.

Legacy is what matters. Obviously no one will every match Jesus in the realm of legacy. But as we contemplate our pilgrimage in life, we must get over the self-serving concept of leadership and set our hearts and minds on legacy.

I’m busy these days trying to crank out more than a thousand words a day on a church history text contracted by Zondervan, and I don’t have a lot of spare time. I leave it to my readers as to whether or not I should expend the money and time to buy and read The Shack. The book is getting incredible BUZZ and the vast vast majority of reviews on Amazon are 5 star. Here is what Eugene Peterson says:

When the imagination of a writer and the passion of a theologian cross-fertilize the result is a novel on the order of The Shack. This book has the potential to do for our generation what John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress did for his. It’s that good!

I learned about the book from my friend Greg Albrecht (editor of Plain Truth Magazine); his review is equally glowing:

You will be captivated by the creativity and imagination of The Shack, and before you know it, you’ll be experiencing God as never before. William Young’s insights are not just captivating, they are biblically faithful and true. Don’t miss this transforming story of grace.

But there is also Michael Burton’s review, one of the two 1-star reviews on Amazon: He says the book is for you if, and only if . . . .

You want to recreate God in your own image;

You find Isaiah’s portrayal of a holy God seated upon His throne to be a disturbing image;

You would prefer to metaphorically cast God the Father as a loving and large black woman named “Papa,” Jesus as a laid back and friendly Middle Eastern man, and the Holy Spirit as a calm and cool Asian woman;

You want a God so small that you and she/he/she can just hang out together as best buddies;

You regard the Bible as an extremely biased, narrow-minded, and insufficient revelation of God in leather binding with “guilt edges” (page 65);

You therefore believe that God talks to people today, and that whatever she or he says to people trumphs biblical truth (page 66);

You believe that God is never to be feared (page 90). . . .

Who is this guy, William P. Young? Here is his own self-effacing bio:

The Shack was a story written for my six children, with no thought or intention to publish. It is as much a surprise to me as to anyone else that I am now an “author”. Overall, I am a very simple guy; I have one wife, six kids, two daughter-in-laws and two grandkids on the way. I work as a general manager, janitor and inside sales guy for a friend who owns a small manufacturers rep company in Milwaukie, Oregon, and I live in a small rented house in Gresham, Oregon, that Kim has made into a marvelous home. My time is spent loving the people that are a part of my life. I am not connected, or a part, or a member of, or involved inside any sort of organization or movement anywhere. The truth is that I doubt anyone would want me. From my perspective that is a very positive thing for both of us. I have lots of incredible friends, and now you are one of those.

My questions to you all are: Have you heard about the book? If so, what’s the BUZZ you’re getting? Have you read it? Should I expend my time and money on it?

As soon as I heard about the TIME (8-23-07) article, “Mother Teresa’s Crisis of Faith,” I commented to my husband that the publication of her personal letters telling of this decades-long “crisis” might very well become her greatest legacy. Then I read the article, which I discovered included a similar statement from Rev. James Martin, an editor of America, a Jesuit magazine. Speaking of her crisis, he comments: “It may be remembered as just as important as her ministry to the poor. It would be a ministry to people who had experienced some doubt, some absence of God in their lives.” Continue Reading »

I received a forwarded email today with a short article by David L. Rattigan with the above title.

He begins with a bit of humor: So there’s these two churches I heard of down in Texas. Outside the Presbyterian Church is a sign: “There ain’t no hell.” And just down the road is the Baptist Church, with the sign outside: “The hell there ain’t!”

He makes a good case that evangelicals really don’t believe in hell. Continue Reading »

Continue Reading »

I’ve been generous to the Catholics this week on matters of Salvation by faith and works, and now what do I get? Pope Benedict XVII kicks me in the face by approving a document that says other Christian communities are either defective or not true churches—that the Catholic church is the only true path to salvation. The other communities “cannot be called ‘churches’ in the proper sense” because they don’t have apostolic succession. Thus their ordinations are not valid. Well, so much for Catholics. Such slurs can go two ways. Continue Reading »

Where did Catholics get the hair-brained notion that we are saved by faith plus works? Have you ever wondered about that? Well, duuuhhh. Maybe they got it out of the Bible. Continue Reading »