Monday Morning Music Ministry

5-18-26

I return to the blog-essay field here after a hiatus of three weeks. I hope that some readers have noted it, and I hope even more that some have missed our posts. I know that I did; after 15 years of weekly MMMMs this is the first “vacation” I have taken, yet I continually am in the mode of seeing themes and inspirations for comments and thoughts to share.

I call the three weeks a Hiatus, but actually it was more: it was a Honeymoon. I married again a year ago, but a book deadline and my wife Mickey’s son announcing his decision to marry himself (not literally) at the time we might have honeymooned, postponed our trip till this Spring. We Sprung to Europe – Ireland, Paris, Germany, and Italy – and were mightily blessed by God with safe travels, seeing old family members, meeting new friends, train travel, famous monuments, obscure sights, beautiful scenery, gorgeous weather, spontaneous side-trips, and great food. Not necessarily listed in order of visceral delights. But God saw to all the connections, which always are a dicey proposition for travellers.

So I quickly will share some impressions from our adventure. This was my 69th trip to Europe; and Mickey lived in Germany for three years, but every journey even to familiar places holds promises of changed environments and new situations. And great food.

We particularly were impressed by our visit to the restored Notre Dame cathedral in Paris (in view from the window of my favorite room of my favorite hotel, the small centuries-old Esmeralda). Mickey and I had been to Notre Dame before the horrific fire, and I had cried like a baby when I watched the 24/7 coverage on France 24 television. Its renovation and restoration has been masterful. Things people had gotten used to – dark images, gray statuary, dusky paintings – are once again alive with brilliant colors and clarity. Stunningly “new” again after almost a thousand years. Among the throng of tourists there were some people praying too, in reserved seats.

For us, as uplifting as this was, as Christians we were sorrowful that this grand cathedral was constructed to honor “Our Lady” and not Our Savior, and so with many other churches honoring saints who themselves honored Jesus – Who is rightfully the proper object of our faith.

In Germany I renewed a connection with an old college friend (55 years since our last face-to-face) who was ordained as a Lutheran minister and moved to Germany. He is hardly a rebel, yet he suffered rebuke from his denomination and dismissal by a congregation for the offense of being too traditional, too Biblical, in his beliefs and preaching.

He occasionally serves these days with Catholic brethren – ironic, in the land of Martin Luther, that the protest-ant church has become “woke” and deserving of reformation itself.

In Italy we noticed a rather familiar role reversal, that churches have the feel, and often the function, of being virtual museums; and in museums and art galleries there is almost a spiritual atmosphere. Not heretical in itself, but the sense of awe and wonder once reserved for “holy” places is now found among hushed pilgrims practically worshiping paintings and statues.

In many European countries, there has been a radical shift over a mere generation. Many people frankly admit that they go to church three times in their lives: to be baptized, married, and buried. Under governments where clergy are paid by the state, pastors become regarded by people in the way that doctors, therapists, and plumbers are.

Returning to America, in person and in this essay, we take no joy nor even temptation to proclaim a clearer spiritual condition, nor superior exercise of Christian faith, back home. In a country settled by varieties of pilgrims committed to Biblical principles and long informed by faith-based standards, we have strayed far. This is now a secular society and a culture of death.

The suppression of religious expression; persecution of churches and sermons threatened by “hate speech” accusations; the acceptance of homosexuality and transgenderism; the advocacy and promotion of abortion; the “educational” establishment exercising in loco parentis “rights” over families’ children; the ubiquity of drugs, abuse, abortion, failed marriages… the West has no right to claim any superior spiritual standing.

But we know that Satan is the prince of this world. We do not look to the past, as marvelous as cathedrals and statues and illuminated manuscripts are (and, they are!) but we must always look to the Celestial City, the life of the world to come.

That is a real journey we must all take.

+ + +

Click: God Of Our Fathers

2-9-26

The Bible is theology: words from God, and a means of understanding Him. It is also history: researchers and archaeologists increasingly discover artifacts and even buried cities that confirm Biblical accounts once considered mere legends or fictional tales. The Bible is also doctrine: it tells us how to live; what is Truth; and the ways to experience joy and salvation… and the ways to be saved from misery and punishment.

Despite these factors, there are people who reject the Bible, starting their critique with the Book’s foundational reliability. I am not referring to non-Christians. It is humanity’s most populous faith, yet only about one-third of the world identifies as Christian. Christians are severely persecuted in some lands, and given a measure of credence in others; even Islam regards Jesus as a major prophet, while Jews still reject Him outright.

But Christianity’s major challenges are not with skeptics nor rival faiths nor persecutors so much, today, as with many who actually call themselves Christians.

Christianity – “Mere Christianity” as C S Lewis termed its basic tenets; and its simple Biblical elements, so clear in Gospel accounts of Jesus’s ministry, and exegesis of His teachings – finds its bitterest enemies in those who corrupt the faith, not only those who ignore it. A false church, after all, cannot hope to be an effective advocate… or even a plausible welcomer.

The very last words of the Bible’s very last book (Revelation 22:18-19, specifically cited by John as a literal transcription of words he received from Jesus) has a frightening warning – If any man shall add unto these things [words of Jesus] God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book.

In other words, God’s Word is sufficient (a Truth stated many times in many ways through Scripture) and must be the basis of our faith. Nothing more, nothing less. Sects and new denominations and cults – I will say, for instance, Mormons with “new” Bibles and even Catholics with inventions of way-stations between earth and Heaven like Purgatory and Limbo – are daring the Lord to fulfill this threat.

Such warnings, and controversies, are not new in the Church. But I believe no less a threat to the Church today are movements that subtract, not only add, to God’s Word.

Indeed, there is a tendency in the post-Christian West to change the Gospel not so much by adding to God’s Word, but subtracting – modifying, reinterpreting, pick-and-choosing, corrupting. Adding and subtracting from Scripture are both heresies, but (not to excuse) adding to God’s Word at least might represent efforts to be more holy or helpful or relevant. The opposite, however – subtracting from Scripture – weakens the Message, compromises with lazier theologies, aims to be more “comfortable” with the world’s standards instead of God’s.

What am I talking about? What “subtractions”? Avoiding preaching against sin. Compromising with “uncomfortable” Biblical teachings. Accepting Politically Correct standards. Not believing the Virgin Birth and other signs of Christ’s Divinity. Calling Good evil and Evil good. Vitiating the Gifts of the Holy Spirit for today. Excusing personal behaviors that the Bible condemns.

Are these elements of modern Christianity? Yes… in many places, many churches, many sermons. Subscribing to these beliefs – we can say, rather, this collection of non-beliefs – might be sending more people to hell than aggressive, rebellious sinning. Being half-Christian is like being half-pregnant.

This life-threatening evil was warned against elsewhere in God’s Holy Word:

Do not add to what I command you and do not subtract from it, but keep the commands of the LORD your God that I give you (Deuteronomy 4:2).

Whatever I command you, be careful to observe it; you shall not add to it nor take away from it (Deuteronomy 12:32).

Do not add to His words Or He will rebuke you, and you will be proved a liar (Proverbs 30:6).

I will reply, ‘I never knew you. Get away from me, you who break God’s laws’ (Matt 7:23).

If your beliefs are pick-and-choose…
You lose, you lose, you lose.

+ + +

Click: The Love of God

7-28-25

This week’s message is an essay I was asked to write for The American Spectator magazine this week. I have edited it somewhat, mainly for length, for the Monday Ministry blog. It addresses the life and recent death of noted pastor John MacArthur. It is an interesting coincidence that MacArthur’s death followed, by mere days, the death of evangelist Jimmy Swaggart (about which I also contributed to TAS and here). They were not only prominent preachers, but they had many points of disagreement – points that were indeed pointed.

MacArthur and Swaggart were, since the death of Billy Graham and with the possible exception of his son Franklin (who has not a similar ministry of pulpit Sundays and mass meetings), these two men represented, and prominently, the two main strains in contemporary Christianity. So their deaths invited comparisons.

Faithful readers know that I am from mainline Protestant tradition, and an encourager of liturgical worship. But I am also Pentecostal, and – as might be decided here – was offended that MacArthur called my people counterfeit Christians and of the devil. (Swaggart and his son called MacArthur “evil” for rejecting Holy Spirit gifts. Tit-for-Holy-Tat…)

MacArthur’s substance and style was judgmental and sounded dogmatic… unless and until he facilely shifted beliefs. He was, for instance, a hyper-Calvinist and (see essay) could easily be called Arminian – but he once stated that he could not explain contradictions in his faith “because God is sovereign and mysterious.” Well, just so. I welcome the mysteries because we need reminders that God is in charge, not our feeble logic.

I just wish some preachers would not cherish their judgmentalism. It smacks of a need to feel superior, and might offend those who struggle for the Truth more than they seek spiritual comforts.

John McArthur, the de facto leader of one of American Protestantism’s major contemporary wings, died on July 14, 2026 at the age of 86. The son and grandson of preachers, MacArthur was the author of more than 150 books and pamphlets; was still active in the pulpit of his church, Grace Community Church of Sun Valley CA, and head of his Master’s University and Master’s Seminary; and hosted a daily radio program/ media ministry, Grace To You.

As a Bible scholar he produced a Study Bible and the Legacy Standard Bible, which has sold more than 2-million copies and has been translated into two dozen languages.

Through such activities John MacArthur became prominent beyond his spiritual base, which could roughly be characterized as Reformed. His influence indeed bled far, with his books, appearances, and pulpit activity; assiduously, he taught in weekly sermons the entire Bible, verse by verse, totaling decades of methodical messages. Otherwise MacArthur’s theology was difficult to label: He was born Baptist; attended Bob Jones University and Biola University; adopted elements of Calvinism, even hyper-Calvinism including predestinarianism and a pre-millenial eschatology. If a distinction must be drawn, John MacArthur was more a teacher than a preacher.

Intra-denominational distinctions in America have through the centuries inspired more intense debates and divisions than secular squabbles. The American church, whose major concerns once were focused on the place of the Social Gospel, has in many venues split into disagreements – often laden with bitter judgmentalism – over matters of the Rapture (when believers will be taken to Heaven and avoid, or not, the End-Times Tribulation); whether the New Testament’s Gifts of the Spirit (prophecy, healing, tongues, etc) given to the First-Century church are valid today; and Modernism/Liberalism.

There are new and shifting alliances in the church, according to issues – such as the Catholics and some Protestants agreeing on abortion and public schools – but for the most part there is a bit of Holy Anarchy in the American church. The umbrella-term “evangelical” has become almost meaningless to everyone except sloppy pollsters. And there are disagreements and sometimes latter-day anathemas exchanged between mainstream denominations, Fundamentalists, Charismatics and Pentecostals, Seeker-Sensitive churches, the emergent movement, Reformed traditions, the Metro movement, accommodationists and relativists, Holiness churches, Christian Zionists, Orthodox Protestants, High-Church schismatics, holders of the Prosperity Gospel, “New Covenant” believers, Mega-Church devotees, Lordship salvationists, Christian Nationalists. and Dispensationalists holding to Pre-, Mid-, and Post-Millenial Tribulation beliefs; etc.

It is interesting to note that, despite his public persona and speaking style – which seemed, and frequently was, stern and judgmental – John MacArthur reflected several and shifting theological strains through his spiritual evolution; and sometimes would bridge various traditions. He was rather a strict Calvinist but never became a Presbyterian (for a time he called himself a Baptist Calvinist, not as an oxymoron). He called himself at one time a “Leaky” Dispensationalist, allowing wiggle-room in discussions about God’s role in history and the coming Tribulation. He fanned the issue of “intersectionality,” maintaining that women had no role in church leadership, especially behind the pulpit (he also called his stance “Complementarianism.”) For years he was dogmatic in defense of a doctrine he called “Incarnational Sonship,” basically maintaining that Christ became separate and holy only upon his earthly birth – a fair description of his singular belief – but he later recanted and admitted that the Old Testament clearly portrayed and illustrated incidents of the pre-Incarnate Jesus. MacArthur eventually identified with St Augustine’s self-corrective “Retractationes,” however writing that “I doubt I’ll ever have the time or energy to undertake” such work.

To many Christians, MacArthur’s major theological battles were with Pentecostals; and many saw great confusion, even harm, to the church. He championed what he called “Cessationism,” the argument that the Gifts of the Spirit – ministry blessings conferred to Christian converts in the Age of the Apostles, nine in number including gifts of healing, wisdom, prophecy, ecstatic prayer, knowledge – were obsolete after the first century. Pentecostals asked for a Biblical citation about their expiration, but none exists. MacArthur would ask whether Pentecostals and Charismatics (virtual exchangeable labels) have ever witnessed miracles like healings in our days… to which millions (and spreading rapidly in the contemporary church) answered “Yes” to the dare. Nevertheless MacArthur held a “Strange Fire” conference that savaged the Gifts of the Spirit, and wrote three books condemning Pentecostals.

In non-doctrinal controversies, as with many contemporary ministries, John MacArthur was not immune. He insisted that Martin Luther King was a “non-believer” who “misrepresented everything about Christ and the Gospel.” Capturing as many headlines as his Covid stances, he resisted public sympathy for a woman in his congregation, Eileen Gray, over sexual abuse, including of her daughter Wendy by a Grace Community employee. MacArthur criticised her but invited prayers for her abuser husband David, even after he was sentenced to serve 21 years to life in prison for aggravated child molestation, corporal injury to a child and child abuse. According to an eyewitness, Gray had confessed to MacArthur years earlier that he had molested his daughter. Many publishers, after this controversy became public, rejected a new MacArthur book about the “War on Children,” and MacArthur ultimately self-published the book.

And leaders of what fairly might be called the two major camps within Protestantism have died within a month of each other. Jimmy Swaggart was the most prominent Pentecostal preacher, with a widespread ministry whose influence touched Charismatics, ecstatic worshipers, Fundamentalists, etc. Swaggart died on July 1, 2025. Two weeks later John MacArthurd died. Once again (very generally speaking) he can be seen as representative of another major group of Christians and traditions – Reformed traditions, Biblical exegetes, etc.

The passing of these two very influential leaders, and so close in time, does not portend a vacuum in American Christianity; but it easily might allow different factions to draw closer. President Trump, who reached out to Swaggart’s next-generation preachers, and who occasionally called both Swaggart and MacArthur (evidently a follower of the Swaggarts’ worship services) already enjoys a fellowship with America’s faith community.

Having bequeathed a huge body of scholarship and micro-focused Biblical exegesis to his subsequent generations, John MacArthur can now, presumably, be counting for himself the angels on the heads of pins, as was his wont.

+ + +

Click: The Church’s One Foundation