Sometimes I have good ideas that scare me to death.

This sermon series is one of them. We’re calling it, “Are we really going to talk about…” The idea is to look at some of the controversial topics in the bible head on. It scares me to death. But it is a good idea.

It’s a good idea for us to refuse to let controversial subjects remain hidden away, untalked about. It’s a good idea for us to bring out in the open things in the bible that are difficult to understand, that not everyone in our church (let alone the world) agree with.

It’s a good idea to say out loud that as followers of Jesus, we believe that God defines what is true and right and good, that the bible and the living presence of the Holy Spirit are gifts to us, gifts which demand our obedience.

Study after study says that most people in church don’t know what the bible says. I happen to think that we at Newberg Friends are better at this than most, but I wouldn’t ever want to be a part of a group that thinks they have all of the sum total of God’s revelation completely figured out. It’s always worthwhile to dig deeper.

My respect for the bible is immense, and I consider it to be completely authoritative to my life.

Even so, I don’t think the literal definition of sola scriptura, trust in the bible alone, is completely possible.

The reality is that no matter what our age, background, or training; no matter how long or short of a time we have been following Jesus, the things we believe about God have been shaped by things other than the bible. Our political views, our parents, our upbringing, our bank accounts…yes, even philosophy and literature and theology have shaped what we believe. It’s unavoidable.

Even if we all spoke Greek and lived in a country with a middle eastern worldview, even if we could transport ourselves across the world and backward in time, it would be impossible to have a strictly “biblical” view of the world.

Our thoughts are shaped by the culture we live in, the experiences we have, and even the language we use.

So, should we give up trying to figure out what the bible means and trying to live by it? Not at all! In fact, it’s precisely because none of us can avoid being shaped by our culture that we should try all the harder to seek out God’s truth. We need each other, we need the bible, and we need God’s Holy Spirit to help us live as God intends for us to live.

We should talk about the things we don’t talk about! Because the truth is, we are being affected by beliefs and philosophies all the time, whether we examine and discuss them or not.

This is a good idea!

We really should talk about some hard things. Paul gives a very good reason why in Ephesians chapter 4, which was read for us just a bit ago.

Part of my responsibility as a pastor, Paul says, is to help us reach unity and maturity in our faith and belief in Jesus Christ. Part of my responsibility is to speak the truth in love, so that all of us together can grow up into Christ. So that we can grow in love and connection with each other and Christ so that we are not blown here and there by deceitful scheming.

This is not learning and intellectualizing for its own sake. This is not, as I seem to see in some Christian circles, a pursuit of answers for their own sake, answers that make us feel good about ourselves.

No. This pursuit of truth and maturity and knowledge is to equip us, his people, for works of service. This talking and discussing and wrestling with issues and the bible and our experience is not so that we feel good in our ivory tower. It’s so that we become people who serve the world in love!

See, this is the part where my biases are showing through.

Knowledge and theology and beliefs must have a deeper purpose for me. They are not an end in themselves. Philosophers as varied as Plato and Solomon and the guy who writes the Dilbert cartoons have said the same thing long before me.

Our pursuit of truth is essential, but only when it is a part of helping us join with God in his mission to share the good news of Jesus with the world.

When I was preparing to be a pastor, I didn’t want to go to a seminary that would just tell me what to believe. I wanted to be stretched and prepared by people different from me, but who loved Jesus.

And one of the images that stands out for me at Fuller Seminary, where I went, is from Professor Colin Brown.

He told us to picture the church of Jesus Christ as a flower, a flower like a daisy with long petals coming out of the center.

The center is Jesus, and all the different petals are like all the different denominations or streams of thought in the church.

The people who are on the part of the petal closest to the center, the ones who are closest to Jesus, actually find themselves to be closer to the people of other denominations who are at the center than they are to people on their own “petal” but away from the center.

That word picture says something important. It says that we will have differences! There are different petals.

But it also says that the more we pursue Jesus, the more we pursue truth, the more we will find a sense of unity in our difference.

It’s not about the petal, it’s about the center!

Part of what I hope we’ll do in this series is all come out of it with a better understanding of the “petal” known as Quakers or Friends. I hope we’ll better know what Friends believe.

But I’m not interested in propping up or recruiting for our petal. I’m interested in helping us be people who pursue Jesus at the center.

However, I happen to believe, to continue with this analogy, that there is no such thing as a daisy without petals. So as much as the center is what is truly important, as much as that’s our goal and our focus, we are incapable of plucking off all the petals and making a “center-only” flower blossom.

This is where we start getting into why this good idea scares me to death.

My hope is to do something that is probably impossible. My hope is to clearly acknowledge the different petals that are out there on a particular issue, define clearly and biblically the “Quaker” petal that we are on as a church, give each person an invitation to join us on the petal but the freedom to be on a different one, all the while pushing us to pursue the center, and not the periphery of the petal.

THAT’S why I get scared to death. Because it’s impossible to do in 20 or 25 minutes with any issue, let alone a controversial one. It’s impossible to do well in a group of 50, let alone a group of hundreds where dialogue and give and take don’t work very well.

Probably the absolute best way to pursue Christ’s truth on issues like hell and environmentalism and communion is to gather a small group of diverse people, read some really good books on the subject, have someone really knowledgeable ask some good questions, have each person present their attempt at what they believe, and then spend lots of time talking and debating together over coffee. LOTS of coffee!

Actually, that’s very close to some of my best memories of seminary. It’s very close to what some of you have experienced in the past in a really good Sunday School class.

We can’t come very close to the “best” way here on a Sunday morning.

But the reality is, very few of us are pursuing the best way anyway. Sunday morning, for good and for bad, is becoming the venue where most people think about what they believe and what God teaches through the bible and experience.

So, even though it scares me, even though it isn’t perfect, we’re going to do our best.

For the next three weeks, and then at various times throughout the year, whoever is preaching on one of these topics will do their best to start a discussion that encourages each of us to pursue the truth of Jesus Christ.

We’ll try to describe the major options out there, the other “petals” so to speak, as well as describing the Friends’ “petal” as clearly as possible. To do this, we’ll have to take a position in most cases. We’ll have to do our best, as we do each week, to say what we think the bible teaches and what the Holy Spirit is prompting us to share.

And not everyone is going to agree. I guarantee it. Every week, every one of these discussions, there are going to be a small or large number of people who don’t agree with the position taken.

That’s ok!

That’s how life as a human being works.

Saying that we will disagree is not the same thing as saying that all truth is relative, or that it’s ok to believe whatever we want. I believe just the opposite. I believe that God defines absolute truth and rightness and goodness, and that we must always have God and the bible shape what we believe.

Christ holds the center of creation together. And every person in the world, to push my seminary professor’s analogy even further, is on a petal somewhere that centers on Christ. They may not believe it or like it, they may not want to be on that flower at all. But I choose to believe that the universe is created and defined by the God of the universe, and that God is bringing together all things under the headship of Christ. This is what the bible teaches. This is God’s story, the one that we are invited to join and intentionally be part of.

All of us are on a petal somewhere, some closer to the Christ center than others.

As a church that follows Jesus, can we agree to some ground rules?

Let’s agree together that the goal is to always be discovering and moving toward the center of Christ.

Let’s agree together that the bible is God’s gift to us. It is what God wants us to know about who he is, who we are, and how to be in right relationship with him. The bible has everything we need in order to know God through Jesus Christ, and it is completely trustworthy and authoritative for us. It’s not ok to ignore or throw out what we don’t like. And it is ok to say, “This part is really hard for me and I don’t understand it…but I want it to define how I live.”

Let’s agree together to listen first and speak second. Let’s agree when we speak truth to do it in love, to do it with the intent of building someone else up and preparing them to serve God actively in the world.

Let’s agree together that there is not a “litmus test” for whether a person is “Quaker enough” to be a part of Newberg Friends. We’re not in the business of defining who is on or off our particular petal; we are in the business of moving toward and loving and serving Jesus Christ at the center!

Let’s agree together that it’s pretty arrogant to think that I always have, or my current group of people always has, a corner on truth. That has a lot of implications. It means because I am pursuing Jesus, not intellectualizing, I want to always listen to others, especially those in whom I see God actively at work. It means that it’s not ok to simply throw out 2000 years of Christian thought because it doesn’t feel right to me.

Let’s agree together that what we are aiming for is humility, not tolerance. When I say “listen” and “speak in love” and “there are different petals”, I don’t say that because I am a politically correct slave to tolerance.

I say that in humility, recognizing that I can and do make mistakes in my thinking and in my actions. I’m asking us to listen and speak the truth in love so that we pursue humility and because all of those things are expressly commanded in the bible.

It’s all about God!

God defines everything! God is the center, not us or our worldview or our beliefs. Even as we try to explore what we believe, we do it because it’s about God, and God’s good news that he loves us and has made it possible to know him and serve him because of Christ’s death and resurrection. That is the good news!