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Occasionally, I am the guest speaker at a church. As a guest, I am not well known, so the pastor says a few introductory words about me. Usually, the introduction boils down to this: “George Paul Wood is a good man and a good speaker, so pay attention to what he says.”

If you’ve never been introduced to an audience this way, you probably don’t know the embarrassment that arises from the discrepancy between others’ perception of you and your self-perception. Would anyone think I’m a good man if they knew what I know about me—my doubts, fears, and besetting sins? Would anyone think I’m a good speaker if they knew the intellectual sausage grinder my message had passed through before delivery?

This isn’t confession time, so I won’t go into detail about my own shortcomings. I simply want to make a point: You are the person who knows you best. You are the expert about you. That’s why, if others want to know you better, you must reveal yourself to them.

The same is true of God. So if we want to know him better, we must listen to his self-revelation. Consider what Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 2:10-13:

The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the man’s spirit within him? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. We have not received the spirit of the world but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us. This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words.

In Christian theology, God exists eternally as a unity of three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The relationship between the first and second persons of the Trinity is described using a familial analogy: father-son. But the relationship between the first and third persons is described using a psychological analogy: a man reflecting on his own thoughts.

The Holy Spirit is the expert about God. If there’s anything to be known about God, the Holy Spirit knows it and reveals it. If you want to know about God, then, you must pay attention to spiritual revelation.

Where does the Spirit reveal God? In creation, of course—for God is the Creator. And in conscience too, for God is our Judge. But the Spirit reveals God best in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ “who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption” (1:30).

How do you come to know God personally? Too many of us rely on “words taught by human wisdom.” To know a man, ask a man to reveal himself. But to know God, you must ask him for the same. God is his own expert, and he speaks to us through the Spirit.

“How can we process the topic of immigration as informed believers?”

This is the question M. Daniel Carroll R. sets out to answer in Immigration and the Bible, a 60-minute video produced by Urban Entry. The video was taped at a forum held by the Christian Community Development Association in Phoenix, Arizona, in January 2010.

Caroll is author of Christians at the Border: Immigration, the Church, and the Border.

You may or may not agree with Carroll’s conclusion, but every Christian needs to wrestle biblically with the immigration issue as he has done.

Richard Stengel, Mandela’s Way: Fifteen Lessons on Life, Love and Courage (New York: Crown, 2010). $23.00, 256 pages.

What would Nelson Mandela do?

Toward the end of Mandela’s Way, Richard Stengel asks this question. Stengel helped Mandela write his autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom, in the early 1990s, and this question helped him “internalize [Mandela] and his ideas.” Mandela’s Way is biographical, but with a moral point. How can reflecting on the life of Nelson Mandela help us live?

The tradition of biography as moral exercise is as old as the Greeks and Romans, not to mention Jews and Christians, but it has taken new form with the uniquely American literary genre of Leadership Secrets of X, usually some famous person. When I picked up Mandela’s Way, I was hoping for the older form of the tradition but worried that I would get the newer one. Few things are more aggravating than the simplification of a person’s life for the purpose of making the reader a better businessman. Stengel, thankfully, did not disappoint me.

As a college student in the late 80s and early 90s, I was aware of Mandela and the struggle of the African National Congress and others to end South African apartheid. I knew little about the man, however. Mandela’s Way is an excellent introduction to his life and struggle, presented thematically rather than chronologically. If one metric of a book’s quality is that it inspires you to read more on the subject, then this book is quite successful.

The subtitle of Stengel’s book is Fifteen Lessons on Life, Love and Courage. My guess is that Stengel’s publisher came up with this verbiage, as a nod to the newer form of moral biography. The lessons are simple—“Courage is not the absence of fear,” “Lead from the front,” “Lead from the back,” etc.—without being simplistic. The way Stengel achieves this is by rooting each lesson in the context of Mandela’s life, struggle, and self-reflection.  

 Prison dominates the narrative. Mandela spent three decades in South African prison. It molded him as a man and as a leader. It also cost him personally in many ways. Stengel takes measure of both the good and the bad in his portrait of Mandela’s life. What emerges is a man who is morally tough, politically pragmatic—except on the all-important issue of a racially just South Africa, and personally resilient. Mandela’s story inspired me.

“What would Nelson Mandela do?” reflects, whether consciously or not, a phrase popularized by American evangelicals: “What would Jesus do?” As a Christian and as a pastor, what strikes me is the absence of religion in Mandela’s life. He is, according to Stengel, “a materialist in the philosophical sense.” He believes that there is “no destiny that shapes our end; we shape it ourselves.” Of course, he aligned with religious leaders such as Bishop Desmond Tutu, but without sharing their faith. And of course, the Afrikaner architects of apartheid were the progeny of the South African Reformed churches.

Which leads to this irony: Opponents of apartheid asked “What would Nelson Mandela do?” precisely because its proponents did not ask, or did not answer rightly, “What would Jesus do?”

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Dick Foth continued his spiritual emphasis series in AG HQ chapel this week. The series is Lessons Being Learned on the Journey. This morning’s message was The Work of God Is to Believe. Enjoy!

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How do we know what we know?

We know some things by reason. I know that I drank a venti chai latte this morning on my way to work. I know that 2 + 2 = 4. I know that if all men are mortal, and Socrates is a man, then Socrates is mortal. I know that George Washington was the first president of the United States. I know that I lived at 973 Begonia Avenue for most of my childhood. These statements are examples of how we build knowledge through reason by means of experience, intuition, logical entailment, credible authorities, and memory.

We know other things by revelation. For example, I know that my wife Tiffany wanted to be Laura Ingalls Wilder when she was a little girl. Her parents dressed her in a prairie frock and bonnet and let her run through the high grass at a field near their house. I didn’t experience this personally. I didn’t intuit it. Logic didn’t entail it. I didn’t remember it. Tiffany told me about it.

Revelation is the means by which we build personal knowledge of others. Obviously, we can use reason too. On my first date, I know that Tiffany wore a white shirt, blue jacket, tan shirt, and brown high-heel boots. (I also know that she wore a thin pink bow in her hair, but Tiff claims my knowledge is faulty at this point.) I observed all this about her and remember it to the present day. But there’s a difference between knowing about a person and knowing a person.

Reason can teach us things about a person, but to truly know that person requires their self-revelation.

The same is true of God. In 1 Corinthians 2:9-10, Paul writes:

However, as it is written:

“No eye has seen,

no ear has heard,

no mind has conceived

what God has prepared for those who love him—

but God has revealed it to us by his Spirit.

It would be easy to misunderstand these words and conclude that reason plays no role whatsoever in our knowledge of God. When Paul writes, “No eye has seen…no mind has conceived,” doesn’t he rule out experience and abstract conceptualization as sources of knowing “what God has prepared for those who love thim”?

Yes and no.

On the one hand, Yes, for the best thinkers of the world never conceived of “Jesus Christ and him crucified” (1 Cor. 2:2), and yet he is “the power of God” for our salvation (1:18). Reason has its limits.

On the other hand, No. We know God by means of self-revelation. Paul writes, “God has revealed it [his plan of salvation] to us by his Spirit.” Reason may not be the source of this knowledge of God, but it helps us sift through what we know to understand him better.

How do we know what we know about God? Revelation assisted by reason. When God reveals himself to us, he gives us brains to understand what he’s said.

Seth Grahame-Smith, Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (New York: Grand Central Publishing, 2010). $21.99, 352 pages.

 Seth Grahame-Smith, the author of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, is making mischief again, this time with a literary mashup of Abraham Lincoln and vampires. I’m a huge fan of the sixteenth president, so I wasn’t sure I would appreciate his being turned into a Yankee Van Helsing. But the book was generally well written and entertaining, even though it became a bit predictable, once you figured out who the vampires were. Also, the ending didn’t work for me at all. Reading fiction is an exercise in the willing suspension of disbelief. But there’s disbelief and there’s disbelief, and the ending was clearly the latter. Still, I’d recommend reading the book for a few nights of creatively mindless entertainment.

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Dick Foth is spiritual emphasis week speaker at AG HQ. His series this week is Lessons Being Learned on the Journey. The first lesson?: What Jesus Thinks Is Important. Enjoy!

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My son Reese is learning to talk. His favorite word is mama, followed closely by bird, dog, Chuck (the name of our Yorkshire Terrier), please, and fish. He throws out dada every now and then, although it’s humbling to think that birds outrank me in my son’s lexicon. Lately, Reese has even been using a two-word phrase at the end of meals: all done.

Reese doesn’t always use these words properly, however. He sometimes calls other dogs Chuck, for example, using our dog’s name for members of the canine family generally. Recently, while walking with me through Bass Pro Shop in Springfield, Reese called every stuffed raccoon, squirrel, bobcat, and skunk a dog. And he seems to think please is a command, not a request.

Reese is a toddler, so his use and misuse of words is a byproduct of his cognitive development. Twenty years from now, if he’s still calling Springfield’s four-legged taxidermy dog, I’ll be worried. But for now, I’m happy with every word and phrase he uses, not to mention all the chirps, giggles, and squeaks.

Like Reese, the Corinthians had a burgeoning vocabulary. One of their favorite words was wisdom. Another was spiritual. They considered themselves wise and spiritual people. Unfortunately, just as my son Reese misused words, so the Corinthians misused them. The only difference? The Corinthians didn’t know they were toddlers, spiritually speaking.

Consider what Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 2:6-8:

We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. No, we speak of God’s secret wisdom, a wisdom that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began. None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.

In this passage, Paul employs the Corinthians’ words, but with the correct meanings.

The Corinthians evidently considered themselves both wise and spiritually mature. But as we have seen from 1 Corinthians 1:18-2:5, their so-called “wisdom” and “maturity” made them ashamed of the cross rather than boastful of the divine power that effected their salvation through it. The Corinthians liked nice speeches that used highfalutin’ philosophical concepts. Paul’s preaching lacked both. So, they considered him foolish and immature by comparison to themselves.

In response, Paul spoke of a “secret wisdom” that only the “mature” can understand. Even “the rulers of this age” did not understand this message. If I were a Corinthian Christian, I’d be interested in what Paul had to say. Who wouldn’t want to be in on the secret that excluded even the high and mighty? So as the Corinthians drew closer to hear Paul’s secret, he talked about…the crucified Lord of glory.

Spirituality must always come back to Jesus Christ crucified. He is God’s wisdom and power for salvation. Any spirituality that doesn’t begin and end with that humbling truth is a toddler’s misuse of words.

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The Greek poet Archilochus said, “The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing.” Building on this insight, Isaiah Berlin divided “writers and thinkers” between those “who relate everything to a single central vision” and “those who pursue many ends.” Using Berlin’s taxonomy, we might say that Paul was a hedgehog whose “one big thing” was Jesus Christ. 

Consider what Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 2:1-5: 

When I came to you, brothers, I did not come with eloquence or superior wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God.  For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. I came to you in weakness and fear, and with much trembling. My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on men’s wisdom, but on God’s power. 

We’ve already looked at this passage once and seen that while the Corinthians liked nice speeches, Paul preferred changed lives. I want to look at this passage again, this time focusing on Paul’s “single central vision,” which is “Jesus Christ and him crucified.” 

Life has many problems. Our bodies age, grow sick, and die. We face financial shortfalls. Family and friends hurt and disappoint us. All of these are important problems, and the Bible outlines solutions to each. But each of these problems pales in comparison to our spiritual problem, which is alienation from God resulting in the judgment of God.  

In 1 Corinthians 6:9-11, Paul asks, “Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God?” He goes on to list several sins as examples of wickedness. (The list is illustrative, not exhaustive.) Then he reminds the Corinthians of the good news: “And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.” 

Our basic problem is spiritual, not physical, material, or social. Even if we solved the latter three problems, we would still have to face the first. Paul’s priority was God’s solution to our spiritual problem, which is reconciliation to God through the death of Jesus Christ. Christ’s death and resurrection are “God’s power” for salvation. Any time sinners turn to Jesus Christ as a result of the preaching of the cross, their changed lives are “a demonstration of the Spirit’s power.” 

Paul doesn’t neglect the other problems. In 1 Corinthians and his other letters, he offers solutions to the problems we face in our health, our wealth, and our relationships. But first and foremost, he calls on us to be reconciled to God (2 Corinthians 5:11-21). 

In our daily lives, most of us are foxes. We have to know many things, if only because we need to make a living. But as we do so, let us not forget Paul’s hedgehog wisdom: Know Christ!

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Anglican. Evangelical. Missional leader. Those are three excellent descriptors of Stott, and they come across clearly in Roger Steer’s very readable biography. The title of the biography, Basic Christian, riffs off the title of one of Stott’s best-known books, Basic Christianity. It is subtitled, The Inside Story of John Stott, and it focuses on Stott’s personal life and associates….

To read my entire review of Roger Steer’s Basic Christian, click here.

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When I was a teenager, I participated in speech competitions hosted by the Lion’s Club. One year—it must’ve been around the same time as Nancy Reagan’s famous “Just Say No!” campaign—our topic was why students shouldn’t take drugs. I researched the topic and prepared my speech.

On the night of the competition, I spoke first. Usually, you don’t want to speak first because you’re still nervous, the mic stand needs adjusting, the audio feeds back—all things that can throw a speaker off his game. I was not a usual competitor, however. I loved to go first because I was so good at public speaking that I’d make anyone who followed me nervous.

Sure enough, I delivered my speech flawlessly. The girl who followed me flubbed her opening lines and had to restart. The person who followed her was so forgettable that I can’t even remember whether he was a he or she was a she. I had first place in the bag.

I lost. To the girl. Who. Flubbed. Her. Speech.

I was incredulous. Even one of the judges later told my parents that, on forensic merit alone, I should’ve won the competition. But there’s more to life than eloquence. I told the judges why students shouldn’t take drugs. The girl who followed me told the judges about overcoming her own problems with drugs and addiction. I had words. She had words backed by power.

In 1 Corinthians 2:1-5, the Corinthians are me, and Paul is the girl:

When I came to you, brothers, I did not come with eloquence or superior wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God.  For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. I came to you in weakness and fear, and with much trembling. My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on men’s wisdom, but on God’s power.

Remember the broader context of these words: The Corinthians loved wisdom and rhetorical excellence. They evaluated Christian leaders on the basis of wisdom and words, then divided because they rated different leaders differently. In order to unify the Corinthians, Paul attacked their mistaken concepts of both wisdom and rhetorical excellence. He reminded them of the foolishness of the gospel’s message (1:18-25). He reminded them of the foolishness of the gospel’s audience, that is, the Corinthians themselves (1:26-31). And he reminded them of the foolishness of the gospel’s messenger, that is, Paul himself (2:1-5). If—from a worldly point of view—the message, audience, and messenger were unimpressive, the Corinthians had no reason to boast and even less to divide.

Back to me and the girl: Which is more important? Speaking well or being changed? The latter, obviously. My speech that night was flawlessly delivered. Her speech was a flawed life transformed. As Christians, let us always prefer changed lives to nice speeches.