Shopping in Santa Cruz.

Out of coffee. Time to go shopping.

And for coffee I need to go to Trader Joe’s, which is one of the better grocery stores in the area. They have more of the odd, hard-to-find items that I like, but they don’t have the less-than-reasonable prices that you find at the yuppie grocery stores like Nugget or Scotts Valley Market. If I want cheese puffs without trans fats, I shouldn’t have to pay three bloody dollars for a seven-ounce bag. If I want a good dark-roast coffee blend, I shouldn’t have to pay $9 for 12 ounces. (The one gripe I have about Trader Joe’s is I shouldn’t have to spend an extra buck for decaf, but $11 for 24 ounces is still better than the $18 it’d cost me elsewhere.)

Trader Joe’s is in Santa Cruz proper. When people ask where I live, I usually say “Santa Cruz” because it takes a whole extra sentence to tell them that Scotts Valley is a yuppie-infested suburb of Santa Cruz; it’s just easier to say Santa Cruz. But there’s a huge difference between suburbs and cities. In a suburb, if you’re liquored up and walking down the street, the cops come by and hassle you. In a city, the cops are too busy handling domestic violence cases and drug busts, and the only people who hassle you are other drunks and the occasional overzealous rent-a-cop.

The lady at my bus stop was quite liquored up; the smell reminded me of Grandma Betty. (Someday I may write an entry about my homeless alcoholic grandmother, but not today.) She accosted me before I could even get to the stop: “Could you do me a favor?”

“Maybe,” I said, which is my usual response to requests for favors.

“They won't let me in the store,” she said, pointing to the downtown Long’s Drugs. “Could you get me six oatmeal cookies? No, wait—six oatmeal cookies and a brownie.” She handed me three thrashed dollar bills. “And you can keep the extra dollar.”

“Let me put my stuff away first,” I said. I was carrying two grocery bags, and I wanted to stash the groceries in my duffel bag before I got on the bus. I also had a roll of postal wrap that wasn’t gonna fit in the bag, and I always feel uncomfortable carrying open grocery bags into a store. When you do this, the rent-a-cops stare at you more often in case you’re planning to do a little shoplifting. But since I’m a white guy and my pants are pulled up properly, they usually let me slide.

I took the $3 and went into the store. The snacks she was talking about are the Little Debbie™ kind; the cheap crap that I used to buy before I realized their ingredients were going to give me my first heart attack before the age of 40. They were 25¢ each, and the brownie was 50¢. If she was hungry, she should have gone to Taco Bell, crappy as it is, and bought 99¢ burritos; they wouldn’t kill her as quickly as the Little Debbie™ junk and she'd have a full stomach. But if she was really concerned about her health, she wouldn’t be spending her food money on liquor.

“Snack time,” I said as I returned with her baggie of goodies. She thanked me and left.

“You're a good man,” commented the fellow who was waiting at the bus stop.

“Not as good as I could be,” I said, “but I try.”

“Well, that’s all you can do,” he said.

No, I thought. I could have done more. I could have—should have—put her extra dollar in the bag; she wouldn’t have found it until she was away, and I didn’t get her the junk food because I needed the dollar. I did it because she asked. It just didn’t occur to me how to slip the money back to her.

Next time, though. ’Cause there will be a next time.

Baby photo.

[Click to embiggen.]

I’m an uncle again.

Notice how I started that with I’m an uncle again. Me me me. As if I had anything to do with this.

Anyway, my brother Chad and his wife Kelli now have a daughter, Faith Elizabeth Leslie, who was born this weekend. My dad emailed me the photo because he’s the only one in the family who takes photos anymore.

Kelli didn’t take any painkillers, which is pretty hardcore. My attitude is we have the drugs; let’s use ’em. But you know, there’s something to be said for natural childbirth. For the rest of your children's lives, you can hold that over their heads. Mom still does it with me. Seems I almost killed her. But that's probably just the way she tells it; I’m the one who still has the forceps scars.

…I’m supposedly announcing the birth, and I’m still going me me me me me. Well, it is my blog. If Faith ever reads this years from now, and doesn’t like it, she can get her own blog, and rant about her loony uncle Kent.

“I know this is out of context, but...”

The phrase, “I know this is out of context, but…” is an interesting phrase you really only hear at bible colleges. Yes, sometimes you hear them outside of college, but rarely. But it’s really quite a unique saying. It essentially means:

After careful [or casual] research on this particular passage of scripture, I have come to the unavoidable conclusion it doesn’t mean what I want it to mean. I want it to have something to do with the point I’m about to make. This is because I want to appropriate some of God’s authority for this point. It’s a really good and valid point, but if I state it under my own authority, it’s all bullflop; but under God’s authority I can make you obey me, the great and holy Preacher Almighty. But it doesn’t actually mean that. So, as a caveat to the biblical scholars (and anyone else who might actually have turned their bible to this passage in order to verify what I’m saying) I will admit it doesn’t mean what I want it to, yet misuse it anyway. I know there are standards, but screw ’em. I have a message to preach, and I need to ram the point home with some scripture.

You might’ve heard the variations of this: “It doesn’t exactly mean that, but…” or “People have used this passage to mean…” or “Many have interpreted this passage this way…” or “The biblical principle behind this passage is…”

Oh yeah, you gotta love that phrase “biblical principle.” I’ve heard this so often it’s nauseating. You know what “biblical principles” are? Teachings of men that require extensive proof-texting before we can call them scripturally valid. It’s as if the bible were in secret code, and the very words aren’t as important as its hidden, mysterious “principle,” which you wouldn’t know about unless you had a wise, cabalistically-trained preacher to show you the way.

These phrases never really sunk in until I taught junior high. It was my first year, we were on a camping retreat with the students, a fellow teacher was slapping together his devotion for the evening (an hour before he had to present it; that’s another rant), and he asked me, “Where in the bible does it say, ‘Where there’s no vision, the people perish’? I’ m g onna talk about how the kids need to have a vision for their lives.”

“Somewhere in Proverbs,” I said. “Hang on, I’ll find it.”

He couldn’t find it because he had an NIV, which renders it, “Where there is no revelation, the people cast off restraint; but blessed is he who keeps the law.” That’s actually a decent translation. I had an NASB, which still used the word “vision.”) The word for “vision” is literally chazon, a revelatory vision. It refers to God’s revelation of himself through his law on Mt. Sinai; without it the people don’t know what to do. It is a parallel to the next line: “Blessed is he who keeps the law,” the law being the revelation of God. Ripping it from this context is a misuse of the scripture. I explained this to him.

“I was gonna use that verse,” he said.

“You’re gonna have to find a better one,” I said. “It doesn’t mean what you want it to.”

He used the verse anyway.

He read from his translation, then he said, “In the King James version, it reads, ‘Where there is no vision, the people perish,’ and that means…” and he proceeded to go along with his mini-speech about how the kids need to make plans and set goals for their lives, otherwise those lives would suck. It was a complete disregard for what the scripture—in his favorite translation!—said.

I confronted him later. “Yeah, the verse didn’t say that,” he admitted, “but I was actually preaching the biblical principle behind it, which is still good.”

Biblical principle, my pasty white heiney. He didn't have time to do his homework, and has no verses to prove this idea (valid as it may be) is an actual biblical concept, so he twists a scripture into saying it. What’re the kids gonna think if any of them actually study this verse?

’Cause you know some of them will. How often have you heard this testimony: “In summer camp, a speaker said something that really struck me,” followed by a verse? Now, how often have you heard them add, “But later I found out it didn’t mean that, and I realized every preacher I ever knew had lied to me, so I stopped going to church and now I’m agnostic”? I’ve heard that second thing much less often… but I have heard it. Too often.

The kids are either gonna think it’s okay to likewise twist scripture, or they’ll think the teacher was trying to deceive them. If we’re lucky, they’ll rightly deduce he was full of crap. If we’re lucky.

“Outing” Joel Osteen.

Most of the bloggers out there exist only to rant about stuff they don’t like. How will adding Osteen to their lists change anything?

I don’t know if you know who Joel Osteen is. Possibly not. He’s the pastor of Lakewood Church, which produces a weekly TV show that features him. I first came across him a few years ago, when I was eating breakfast one Sunday and watching TV church. (I’d usually watch Charles Stanley, who isn’t bad theologically, although I’d like to hear him actually do a real exposition of a passage for once, and I wish he’d stop trying to sell Alaska cruises.) Anyway, Stanley was over with, and some other not-so-good preacher’s show was starting, so I flipped the channels and came across Osteen’s show.

I figured it was a church show because it is, after all, broadcast Sunday morning. It struck me as… kinda useless. More useless than many of the other TV church shows. He wasn’t going into detail about any passage of scripture. He wasn’t trying to make a profound theological point. He wasn’t foaming at the mouth about some bizarre End Times conspiracy or about how “the homosexuals have taken over Hollywood.” He was just blithering about how God wants us to have happy, prosperous lives. Then there was a commercial about how they were moving the church from the large, cavernous building they already occupied (which I at first thought was a rented auditorium) into an even bigger building (which I later discovered was the Compaq Center). So he’s got a big giant church. No wonder he has his own TV show.

I didn’t think much about him after that, until I found that Christian Book Distributors was selling a book of his, Your Best Life Now, in which he announces that God wants us to have happy, prosperous lives. Just look at Osteen: He has a happy, prosperous life. And if he has one, surely God wants everyone to have one, right?

’Cause if you don’t have a happy, prosperous life, there’s something wrong with you. Why, look at all those unhappy, financially unprosperous Christians in China that are too busy hiding from the government to buy themselves Lexuses and thousand-dollar suits. There must be something wrong with them. And those missionaries! What’s with them giving up comfort and financial stability for God? Surely he would rather they stay home, living in air-conditioned comfort and eating bon bons; by that example people will just flock to Jesus.

…Okay, I really gotta cut back on the sarcasm.

Midterm elections #4: Pressure on the pastors.

Why do Christians keep falling for the claims that politicians will help us?

I’m looking forward to reading Gregory Boyd’s The Myth of a Christian Nation, in which he discusses separating church and state in the pulpit. (You can read an excerpt of it here.)

There are unfortunately many who see the evangelical church as another wing of the Republican Party—both in the party and in the church—and it strikes me as nuts that the church which claims to follow Jesus, seems to have paid no attention to Jesus’s rejection of political power. Didn’t they read this?—

Taking [Jesus] up

and showing him all the kingdoms on Earth

in an instant of time

the devil said to him:

“I will give you all this power

and all their honor

for it was given over to me

and to whomever I want to give it to.

If you prostrate yourself to me,

everything is yours.”

Answering, Jesus said, “It’s written:

‘You will prostrate yourself to the Lord God,

and him alone will you worship.” [Lk 4.5-8]

But you’ll notice how often everything is thrown away in the pursuit of political power; how it all too frequently becomes a god to those who chase after it, and how like so many idols there is a devil behind it, accepting the worship.

Because it’s power. Political power is simply human power, seized from God in the very same way that the devil tries to seize power from God, from us, and from anyone who gets in its way.

And if the church goes along with it, the church will get political power. Remember the Moral Majority? What did the Christian Right do once it was given political power in the early ’80s? That’s right; it squandered it. What did it do again once it was given political power in the mid ’90s? Squandered it again. The Christian Right constantly is told, and tells its members, “Elect us and we’ll fix all the moral problems in the country.”

Now we have a president and a Congress that claim the Christian Right as their constituency. How’re they doing? Well, they haven’t done jack squat about the moral problems; seems they’ve invested all their time into this excuse for their re-election: “These things take time. I’ll need another term to do it in. Don’t vote for the other guy, okay? I really do believe in all the things you do. I can prove it if you give me another term.” It’s like a wife-beater begging to be taken back; and the American people, particularly the Christian Right, are the suckers with low self-esteem who do it.

More ranting later.

Amusing Comic Strip: “Are we even cavemen?”

B.C. parody. B.C. by Johnny Hart.

Johnny Hart didn’t actually draw this.

B.C. has got to be one of the most useless comic strips I’ve ever seen. It was a lot funnier before Johnny Hart became a Christian and felt the need to Christianize a strip which is after all about people who, as suggested by the strip’s title, live before Christ.

Every Easter strip has to be a message about how Jesus is risen (despite not yet being born), and every Christmas strip has to be about Jesus being born. Yet the strip’s events precede the Exodus, the nation of Israel, and the Roman Empire. It’s primarily about a bunch of guys in black shorts with one suspender apiece, assorted talking animals (including dinosaurs and a race of super-intelligent ants), and a proto-human caveman who is apparently a ball of fur with a mouth and feet. It’s always been that. The only things that changed after Hart became a Christian is there are less inventing-the-wheel type jokes, which he ran out of.

Instead, the strip contains lame puns, recycled one-liners, and occasional anti-idolatry or anti-evolution jabs that often don’t even make sense. (Being anti-evolution, in spite of his proto-human caveman character, never did make sense.) And the women in the strip have the rather less-than-Christian names of “the fat broad” and “the cute chick.” Hart’s Christianity is displayed on his sleeve, but you can’t find it otherwise in his strip.

Why, then, does this strip run at all in newspapers? Because American Christians like the fact that Hart displays his Christianity on his sleeve. They like a Christianity that’s all talk and no inward change. It resembles theirs.

So Hart’s strip will stay in newspapers until he dies, and if you’re a fan of irony it will be ever so amusing when the syndicate hands off his strip to a pro-evolution non-Christian who starts telling caveman jokes again and infuriates B.C.’s fan base.

Update, 12/13/2024: Hart died in 2007, and his grandson Mason Mastroianni produces the strip now, with the help of his brother and mom. It’s still kinda Christian, ’cause the Mastroiannis are Christian, but way less preachy. It’s even, occasionally, funny. And the women were finally given proper names; “Fat Broad” became Jane, and “Cute Chick” became Grace.

Why we don’t want Bethany students at our church.

Actually, we do want Bethany students… but we’ll pass if you fit this description.

And let me preface this by saying this stuff is generally true of Bethany University students, and college students at most Christian schools. If you’re an exception, ignore this. Otherwise, here’s why we don’t want you.

1. You’re too flaky. Part of the point behind college is that you’re figuring out what to do with your life. And you should. You should avoid commitments until you’ve had lots of time to figure out if you really want to do this with your life. But you don’t know how to take the necessary time you need to figure stuff out. You just commit. Then you discover it wasn’t the right decision, and bail—often after doing the same dumb thing as before, and committing yourself to something else you hadn’t thought through. You need to slow your decision-making process down; and we need to stop accepting your commitments as if they were rational decisions.
2. Your real commitments are elsewhere. But honestly, you aren’t in the Santa Cruz area because you’re looking for a home church. Few people, other than professional clergy, choose to live someplace because of a church. You’re here because of college. College will take priority. You say God is your priority, but really it isn’t. Until you recognize this, you’re an idolater, and the church has enough idolaters.
3. You confuse your education with anointing. (I especially recognize this because I’ve been guilty of this.) Just because you’re a college student—and the others aren’t, and they don’t know the newest and latest and greatest things in academia—you cop this attitude of, “I know how things should go, and you don’t” or “I still have my ideals intact, and you sold out years ago” and crap like that. This is particularly found among bible majors (like I was) and typical of people whose ideals take precedence over people, like college students.
4. You confuse your adulthood with authority. Now that you’re old enough to vote, you often assume that you’re mature enough to take charge of things. You want to lead the youth ministry, or the food ministry, or an outreach, or a class. And you shouldn’t. The church model of leadership is servanthood. You need to shut up and wait for authority to be given to you instead of seeking it out. But often college students don’t want to wait for that to happen; they have résumés to compile.
5. You already have a home church. And it isn’t ours. So, when Easter and Christmas and the other important times come along, you’re never there. When Christmas break and spring break and summer break come along, you’re never there. Once you graduate, you’re gone. We can’t make any significant or long-term plans that include you. God help us if we put you into a position of leadership. It’s great for your résumé, but the ministry often becomes a shipwreck once you leave; instead of seeking a capable successor, you were more interested in going out with a bang.
6. You don’t tithe. Your money goes to your home church. Those of you that can tithe don’t understand how tithing works, so you keep your money because you “can’t afford to tithe,” or give a fraction of it. It’s not that we need your money, ’cause it honestly isn’t enough to pay the bills; it’s that your tithe represents your real commitment to the church, and it isn’t there. (Same with the licensed Assemblies ministers who give all their money to the district instead of the church. Where your money goes, so goes your heart. If you cared, you’d go get a waiver from the district so you could contribute to your church, but you don’t; so it’s not really your church, no matter what your résumé says.)
7. You don’t give time to the church. College is not a 24-hour vocation, but you treat it like one with the after-classes social events, the afternoon naps taken so that you can stay up until 2 a.m., and all the other artificial functions that mean you “don’t have time” for midweek church functions. You can make time for movie night with your buds, but you always have homework to do during Wednesday night prayer. And when midterms, finals, and major socials roll around, you’re gone.
8. You think your spiritual needs are already met with morning and evening chapels, dorm devotionals, the occasional bible class in your general ed package, and your extracurricular ministries. I’ve often heard it said that you don’t need to go to church because the school is the church. That’s bull-flop. The school resembles a church, because it’s full of Christians; but can you go evangelize new converts, take them to the school, and get them baptized and discipled? Not unless you pay tuition. The fellowship in the school is entirely dependent on whether you’ve paid tuition, not whether you have a relationship with Jesus. It’s based on Mammon, not Christ.
9. You’re a bunch of gossips. When you meet outside of church, the conversations always turn to, “The pastor should do this,” or “The leadership doesn’t know what it’s doing,” or “The sermon sucked.” The pastor is criticized for being too human and making normal human mistakes; the church is criticized for not having things exactly the way you like them; but you’re too “busy” to step up and fix things. You never say any of this stuff to the face of the person who needs to hear it. Instead of offering help, you spend most of your time bitching. Shut up.
10. You’re a bunch of spectators. To this point, I’ve talked a lot about the people who do contribute time to the church; but the bulk of you contribute nothing to the church, because you’re only there Sunday mornings, and that’s all. The rest of the week, we don’t see you, we don’t know you, you speak nothing into our lives, and you’re only there because you like the worship or the preaching. You take and don’t minister. You’re parasites, just like 80 percent of the church as a whole, whose faith has no works and is dead.
11. Your presence deceives the leadership of the church into thinking, “Hey, look at all the people we have. We must be doing something right!” And so we don’t do anything. We wind up putting all our time and effort into busywork, ministering to people who won’t change, won’t grow, won’t contribute, won’t learn, and will render us impotent, weak, and distracted. Just like the devil wanted.

So depart from us, you who work iniquity. Come back if you grow up.