The Bible story begins with God creating.

The Bible story ends with God saying, “I’m making everything new!” (Revelation 21:5).

All throughout the Bible story we see the creative work of God, and we have every reason to believe that God will go on creating once we enter into the dimension of existence known as “eternity”. That’s because creativity is not just something God does; it’s something God is. Creativity is part of his very nature.

For some reason, this isn’t a big subject covered in most works of systematic theology. But it’s there, literally, from beginning to end.

So, it shouldn’t really surprise us that this creative God should instill in human beings (the one part of his creation said to have been created in his image) some of that same sense of creativity.

Did the Fall mess with some of that? Sure. Are all of our creative impulses reflective of the image of God in us? No.

But the fact that we have creative impulses at all is a reminder of who we are and where we’ve come from (or possibly where we are and who we’ve come from).

Perhaps more importantly, shouldn’t we expect that as we become more and more transformed into his image we will become more and more creative?

This is what I would look like as a character on “The Simpsons”:

The first verb in the Bible — the fifth word in the English translation — is “created”. As in, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”

Before God did anything else — before he rescues or redeems or gives a command or anything — he creates.

Why don’t churches talk more about that? We talk about creation, but we talk about it in a utilitarian, this-proves-a-bigger-point kind of way. We talk about it in the context of countering darwinian evolution and naturalism. We talk about God having the right to make certain demands because he is the Creator and we are the creation.

But we don’t talk much about God as a creative person.

You’d think creativity would play a larger role in the life of a church seeking to be the incarnational presence of God in this world. But it doesn’t.

We’re fond of verbs in the Bible: trust; obey; respond; tell; go; love; serve. Preachers all across the world had sermons with lots of verbs in them yesterday. Millions of people attended and were told to do various things in order to become more like Jesus.

I wonder how many of them were told to be creative. And I wonder why we don’t talk about it more.

About a year-and-a-half ago I was flying home from North Carolina after spending a weekend teaching at a church there. The man sitting next to me pulled out a philosophy test and began filling it out. I asked him if he was a student, and he said that he was actually a first-year professor of philosophy at a state university here in the southeastern portion of the United States. He asked what I do, and the conversation took a strange turn when I said, “I’m a theologian.”

He immediately told me that he had been a graduate assistant for Daniel Dennett, and he wondered if I’d had a chance to read Breaking the Spell (which had just come out not too long prior to this). I had not, so he told me the central theme of the book. I told him that I had read Sam Harris‘ book, The End of Faith. He asked me if I might be afraid to read Dennett’s book. I smiled and said, “Why would I be afraid?” He responded, “Well, it might cause you to question some things.”

I assured him that I questioned things all the time. That’s my job.

He didn’t quite know how to respond to that. “What do you mean?” he asked.

I told him, “I don’t just read Christian books. I want to know the other points of view. I couldn’t speak to the issues intelligently otherwise — at least not with any credibility.”

Then I asked him, “Do you think Dr. Dennett read enough to interact responsibly with any Christian scholars? There actually are some, you know.”

I even listed some for him: Ravi Zacharias. Alister McGrath. N.T. Wright. Alvin Plantinga.

He’d never heard of any of them.

We continued our conversation for a while. He asked if I was a dualist. I told him that I was an ontological dualist. He seemed to know what that meant, but he looked a little uncertain so I explained. “I believe there are two categories of things: God and not-God.” Now he understood. I pushed a little farther on some things that appear in the atheist’s worldview that would require greater faith than most Christians have. I asked him how we got from nothing to something. And how did we get from chaotic something to ordered something when that violates the law of entropy (that things move from order to chaos unless acted upon by an external force). And how do we even know that we know what we know.

He admitted that there were some sizeable gaps in his belief system — especially epistemological gaps.

“Perhaps,” I said, “you’ve been prejudiced against the supernatural so much, so indoctrinated by Hume’s closed system that you’ve ruled out the existence of something transcendent. Maybe that transcendent thing is a person, and maybe that person could fill in those gaps if you’d let him.”

“You’re a preacher. How do you know Hume?” he wanted to know.

I went on to say, as gently as I could, that I am not a Christian because I have to be or because I’m afraid to not be. I am a Christian because it makes the most sense to me. If there is another belief system that is as comprehensive, practical and correspondent to the way things actually are in this world, I’d most likely jump ship. But I’ve read every belief system I can find, and Christianity beats them all hands down.

He apologized and said he really had to get back to preparing his test. I told him I understood and actually had some work to catch up on myself. We flew the rest of the way home in silence.

When we got off the plane, he caught up to me at baggage claim and said the strangest thing. He said, “I’m embarrassed.”

“Why?” I asked.

“Because you know more about my field than I know about yours. And I’ve made fun of people like you. I wonder if my friends and colleagues would give your literature as fair a reading as you’ve given ours. And yet we call you the fundamentalist.”

I gave him my card and told him I’d love to meet him for lunch sometime. He never contacted me again.

I tell you that anecdote because I think there are a lot of people like him. He’s educated, but he’s been educated into a worldview — without even realizing what was taking place. He’s prejudiced against Christians, but the Christians he’s prejudiced against are more a figment of his imagination than the real Christians who live and work around him. If Christians can keep from panicking, listen and speak in a winsome manner, we can do more than any protest or saber-rattling ever could. Maybe that’s what Peter had in mind in 1 Peter 3:15-16.

I also tell you that story because I’ve been asked to appear on a Christian television show to talk about what is being called “the new atheism” (demonstrated by people like Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens and Daniel Dennett). They’ve told me that they’re going to be interviewing a professor of philosophy from a state university in the southern portion of the United States (what are the odds it could be my traveling partner?). They want me to interact some with what they consider to be attacks on the Christian faith and elaborate a little on the historical repercussions of atheism.

But I do not want to sound combative or afraid. So, I’m asking you: What would you hope I would say? What could I say that might be helpful to Christians who want to discuss these issues in a rational and winsome manner?

I’ve had some folks ask me how my new job as Teaching Pastor for The Bridge will impact what I do here at Faith 2.0. The answer is: I really don’t know.

My agreement with The Bridge is that I’ll preach up to 20 times per year. That still allows me lots of time to travel, write, consult and speak in other places. We all know that this is kind of experimental, so we’re trying to be flexible as we move forward.

With all that in mind, the teaching calendar has now been set for the remainder of 2007, and I’m working on my personal calendar for the rest of the year. These are dates I currently have available:

September 14-16, 28-30

October 12-14

November 16-18

December 7-9, 14-16, 21-23

If you’re interested in having me come speak to your church on any of those weekends, leave me a comment or go here and fill out the speaking request form. I’ll be working on my 2008 calendar soon.

This summer has been a difficult time for my family financially. We had a water heater go belly up. One of our vehicles gave up the ghost. Jill’s father’s health continues to deteriorate, and she took the girls to spend five weeks out in California to be near him. I flew back and forth a couple of times, and none of it was cheap!

So, for those of you who are not in a position to invite me to speak but would like to know how to support what I do here at Faith 2.0, you can do two things: (1) make a tax-deductible donation to this ministry; (2) pray for God to open new doors and provide opportunities for me to teach in other places.

I thank all of you who have given so generously in the past. God has done amazing things over the past couple of years. I do not believe he is through with us yet!

You cannot read the Bible without quickly discovering paradox and mystery.

How do you adequately explain the Trinity? You don’t. As soon as you’ve written the exhaustive description of how God is three and one simultaneously, you’ll find that what you’re describing is no longer the Godhead as it is revealed in the Bible.

Was Jesus God or man or both and how is that even possible? Good luck answering that one!

God chooses us, but we’re told over and over again to choose him. Which is it?

Faith alone saves us (or is it God’s grace?), but we’re told we must have works. That’s a difficult knot to untangle — maybe even impossible.

Is it all about God, or is it all about me, or do we even need to set the two up in diametric opposition to one another?

The Bible is chock full of mystery, and that bothers some of us. It’s also rife with paradox, and that’s frustrating for some of us. We want a theology with no holes. Mystery and paradox seem like holes to us.

Why do you suppose there is so little time spent discussing mystery and paradox in most Christian teaching?

And which is your favorite paradox/mystery in the Bible?

My favorite is that we’re told to be as innocent as doves and as shrewd as serpents (Matthew 10:16).

Okay, I’ve heard this phrase for a while now, and I want to talk about it:

It’s all about God.

When I was a kid our church used to sing this song that started out “All of self and none of Thee”. And then it would switch to “Some of self and some of Thee”. Then it was “Less of self and more of Thee”. Eventually it was “None of self and all of Thee”.

Note: I was once in a church where this song was to be used as the closing song. The sermon went long, and the songleader, clearly not thinking about the lyrics, decided to save some time by singing only the first verse. The song did not have the intended effect!

The goal, according to this songwriter, was to totally empty yourself of yourself and be totally Jesus (or God or whichever member of the Godhead we were supposedly singing to — though it probably wasn’t the Holy Spirit — but that’s another story).

But it always confused me. If there’s none of me and only Thee, then I don’t really exist anymore, do I? In that case, I’m not really necessary, so what am I doing here? Is my only task here to stop being me, and, if so, why did the biblical writers seem to continue living and having their own personalities and vocabularies and all that?

These are the questions that plagued my 15-year-old mind as I stood singing that song on Sunday mornings.

We stopped singing that song at some point in time. But we still have the sentiment around, and it shows up in statements like, “It’s all about God. It’s not about me at all.”

I know a preacher who prays before he speaks that God will make him like a clear piece of glass, that he will be completely invisible. He prayed that for me a couple of times, and I just couldn’t affirm that prayer. Years ago I thought that I had to stop being me in order to be used by God, but I’ve found that when I’m most me is when I’m most effective. It just doesn’t feel like a very God-honoring prayer for me.

So, what do you think? Is it not about us at all? Is it not about relationships and the beautiful creation that exists for us to enjoy and having meaningful work to do? Is it not about honoring the unique personality and gifts God has given to each of us? Is it really all about God?

Absurd (adj.): wildly unreasonable, illogical or inappropriate; foolish; arousing amusement or derision; ridiculous.

Jesus’ last words to his followers — just before he left them — were over-the-top. He told them, “Get out there into the wide world and take this message with you to the far corners of creation. Get people everywhere to convert from whatever their faith is in currently to this new operating system I’ve introduced.”

This message has become so familiar to people who attend churches that we’ve lost a sense for just how absurd it must have sounded to the original audience.

See, there wasn’t really much of a concept of “conversion” back then. Most people in the ancient world believed in multiple gods or goddesses. You didn’t need to switch loyalties in some kind of exclusivistic way. If you found a god you liked, you just added him to your collection. Most people had multiple gods, and all the gods were cool with that. It wasn’t an either/or proposition to them; it was both/and. You had a god that helped you at work and one that helped you at home. One god was in charge of the rain, and one god was in charge of the harvest. People didn’t convert.

Well, there was this one group of people who believed in just one God: the Jews. But they didn’t really have any notion that they needed to get out and convince people to switch from following multiple gods to following just one. If someone came to them and wanted to become part of their group, they’d let them. But they didn’t feel compelled to go out and convert people.

So, when Jesus gives these marching orders to his followers, it’s kind of a new thing he’s asking them to do.

“You want us to go out and convince people to swap their belief system for this new one? Okay, that’s original. Do we have any kind of budget for this project? A strategic plan? Do we at least have transportation?”

Jesus was a little sketchy on the details.

Think of this: 11 guys who had never traveled more than 100 miles away from their homes going out to the ends of the earth on a mission that had never been attempted before — never even thought of in all of human history. They have no money, no connections and no plan.

This is absurd.

Except for one thing: it actually started to happen. The only thing more absurd than the idea itself was its success.

I’ve spent the last two months pouring over the Book of Acts, and I’ve been amazed again at how bold and innovative the early church was. Did they make mistakes? Of course they did! Were they messed up and dysfunctional? Of course they were! Should we attempt to imitate them in every detail? Of course not!

But they knew that God was at work in their midst, and because of that belief they knew they could take absurd risks of faith, trusting that God was going to get his will accomplished one way or another.

Perhaps the biggest advantage they had over us is that there was no box for them to try to think outside of. The “box” wouldn’t be constructed for several decades yet, so they had the luxury of making things up as they went along.

Perhaps the most absurd thing of all was when we decided it was a good idea to build a box in the first place. Wait…maybe it was when we decided to climb in the box and lock close the lid. Wait…maybe it’s the fact that so many churches know they’re trapped in the box and still refuse to do whatever it takes to get out.

What do you think is the most absurd thing about churches?

Jesus likes me.

The final thing I dig about Jesus is probably the hardest one to accept. I can deal with the idea that Jesus loves me. He kind of has to, right? He’s God, and God is love. But I sometimes have to battle the idea that Jesus might be loving me through gritted teeth — like he really wishes he could whack me a good one but he can’t because he has to love me.

But Jesus told his disciples an amazing thing once. He said, “I don’t think of you as just servants. I think of you guys as friends” (see John 15:15).

I know where I’ve been, and I know what I’ve done. It’s not always easy to like me or to love me (just ask my wife!). It’s difficult sometimes to think that Jesus doesn’t just put up with me from some sense of covenantal obligation. He doesn’t just want to order me around. He actually likes me, likes spending time with me, likes talking with me.

But the Bible is pretty plain about this. Jesus calls me his friend. He would like to spend time having lunch or dinner with me, just talking about stuff.

Jesus likes me, he really likes me!

A few hours ago my family returned from California. Jill and the girls have been out there for five weeks. I was out there for two, which is long enough to adjust to the time change. It’s nearly three in the morning, but my body thinks it’s just now midnight.

We got home just as the San Francisco Giants’ game against the Washington Nationals was starting, so I was watching intently as Barry Bonds strode to the plate and hit a double to the gap in his first trip to the plate. I was also watching when he came up again and lined a solid single. I was really glad to see the Nats actually pitch to him.

I was laying down with my three-year-old daughter when he came to the plate a third time. She’d wanted her mother to read her a story, but Jill was busy so I stepped in as a not-entirely-welcome second-stringer. It took some convincing, but Amelia eventually decided that she’d settle for me — since I was the only parent available. We talked for just a couple of minutes, and I could tell she was getting drowsy. By this time Barry was in the on-deck circle, but she was so close to falling asleep that I didn’t want to move for fear of waking her up. Her breathing was just starting to go deep, and she was so tired.

I could barely hear what was going on from the television downstairs. It got kind of quiet. Then it got really loud, and I knew what had happened. Jill said, “John, come quick!”

I remember a warm spring afternoon in 1981 when I got to see the debut of a chubby Mexican teenage phenom pitcher named Fernando Valenzuela. I remember where I was (Pepperdine Dorms) when I saw Kurt Gibson hit the homerun in the World Series in ‘88. I remember where I was (Dunwoody, GA) and who I was with (Rick Hazelip) when Dave Justice redeemed himself by hitting a solo shot against the Cleveland Indians in ‘95. I watched live on ESPN as Cal took his victory lap around Camden Yard. I remember watching Big Mac hit number 62 from a sports bar in Staunton, Virginia. I’ve seen my share of memorable baseball moments — some of them in person, most of them live on television.

But I had to settle for instant replay this time. And I’m okay with that.

Performance-enhancing drugs are part of the game. Let’s be grownups about that. To some extent, they always have been. Roger Maris and Mickey Mantle were getting more than vitamins in those injections! More than half of the guys who’ve been busted for using steroids have been pitchers. I’m not saying it’s right, and I’m not saying Barry’s clean. I don’t know anything about him for sure (except his noggin has gotten huge, and that ain’t normal), but I do know that if a hitter’s using, odds are the pitcher is, too. So, the field is pretty level as far as I can tell.

And 756 is a lot of homeruns.

I’ve never hit one in a Major League ballpark filled with tens of thousands of cheering fans. I don’t know what it feels like to round those bases and have Hank Aaron congratulate you on the Jumbo-tron.

But it can’t be much better than having your youngest daughter fall asleep on you.