Page 2262 – Christianity Today (2024)

In a recent blog post at 9Marks.org, Kevin DeYoung wrote: "Since 2002, the year I was ordained, I estimate that I've preached almost 500 times. It took about 450 sermons to find my voice."

Finding one's voice is a challenge for any preacher. Who can resist that desire to become the preacher who first inspired you, or the preacher whose handling of the Word still moves you? After all, preaching is like writing: a skill learned by imitation.

Still, every young preacher must eventually learn that he is neither John Piper nor Rob Bell. And no congregation wants to sit under someone suffering from either delusion.

Leadership asked three pastors about their journeys in finding their own voice: Jonathan Falwell of Thomas Road Baptist Church in Lynchburg, Virginia; Bryan Loritts of Fellowship Memphis (Tennessee); and Joshua Harris of Covenant Life Church in Gaithersburg, Maryland.

Each has sought to do what DeYoung implores of preachers: "Let your person constantly be refined by the Spirit of God, and let the truth of God's word shine through your own personality."

Who are your preaching role models?

Jonathan Falwell: Most of what I've learned about preaching has come from listening to my dad, Jerry Falwell, for 40 years. He was one of the greatest preachers I've ever heard. I've also learned a great deal from Rick Warren and Adrian Rogers. God blessed both of these men with great skills and a huge heart for ministry.

Bryan Loritts: As the son of a preacher, I was exposed early on to some incredible preachers. Men like my father—Crawford Loritts—as well as Tony Evans, Kenneth Ulmer, A. Louis Patterson, and Gordon Kirk all played a huge part in my life.

Joshua Harris: In my teen years, I idolized Billy Graham and Ravi Zacharias. I listened to so many Zacharias sermons I actually started speaking with a slight Indian accent, which must have baffled my audiences. In recent years my mentor in ministry, C.J. Mahaney, has been a big influence, along with John Piper and Tim Keller. John Stott's book Between Two Worlds has shaped me as well.

How do you try to be like them?

Harris: C.J. Mahaney has taught me to always keep the cross of Christ in view. Before I met him, I was prone to be moralistic, more focused on our activity than Christ's finished work. I want to be like him and preach more passionately about Christ crucified than anything else. I also think C.J. uses humor very effectively. I want to be like John Piper in his white-hot zeal for the glory of Christ. But that's not a preaching style, that's a heart and life that spills out into preaching, and it's what I pray will be true of me.

"I want to give equal weight to content and delivery. We tend to err on one side at the expense of the other."—Bryan Loritts

Falwell: I am acutely aware that God gives every preacher different abilities and talents and that God will use every style to reach the hearts of people. So I don't necessarily attempt to be "like" anyone else in my preaching style. Rather, my goal is to use my abilities and talents to make the greatest impact for Christ. The best way to do that is to base all that I do on the truths of Scripture. In that way I try to be like my dad and Rick Warren.

Loritts: Some of my preaching mentors are legends in the traditional African-American church, where there's a natural flair and poetic flavor that comes with the office of pastor. But then there are guys like my father who modeled for me the huge importance of being a hybrid—one whose communication style can adjust appropriately to a white context or a black one. Within these different cultural expressions, I have picked up key preaching lessons, like how to use illustrations, from the master, Tony Evans, and transitioning well between points, from Gordon Kirk.

How do you differ from them?

Loritts: To my mentors' generation, preaching tends to be a lot more linear and authoritative. While I also feel deeply that biblical preaching must be authoritative, I tend to position myself with my audience more as a fellow traveler in the journey of faith.

What was also really popular in my mentors' era of preaching was the "do these three things and you'll have this kind of life" approach. I've shied away from that over the last five years because I feel that matters of faith aren't that clean. Like jazz, my preaching tends to be more dissonant.

Falwell: My dad and Adrian Rogers had booming, unmistakable voices. Even now, when I hear audio clips of their sermons, I am amazed at their ability to fill a room. My style is far more conversational.

Harris: There's a depth and weightiness to the preaching of the men I've mentioned that I simply don't have. I try not to let this discourage me. I'm at the beginning of my journey as a preacher and so I trust that will come with time.

Everything I'm preaching, I'm preaching for the first time. But in terms of style, I try to make things very simple—maybe because that's the only way I can understand the truths myself. So for me, that often means I have to make use of a lot of illustrations.

What does your weekly preparation look like?

Falwell: My dad always said that nothing of eternal importance is ever accomplished apart from prayer. So my weekly sermon preparation starts with prayer. Then, during the week, I spend a great deal of time reading supporting materials. At the end of the week, I focus on the preaching outline. I try to make sure that the basic truths I want to get across are clear. Then, on Sunday morning, I rise very early and am in the office for two hours before our first service, doing nothing but praying and reviewing the sermon.

Loritts: In my weekly preparation, I want to give equal weight to content and delivery. I think all preachers tend to err on one side at the expense of the other. So by Wednesday night, I am done with my research—the word studies, reference work, and a basic outline.

Thursday is my study day, with no appointments, and that's when I fill in my outline and write a rough draft. Friday morning I write the final draft, which is word for word. Then I step away until Saturday evening, at which point I read the manuscript three times, just to get a good feel for which thought follows which.

Sunday morning I get up at 3:30 to pray over the sermon (I have also been praying over it during the week), read over the manuscript again, and rehearse it once. My practice is to memorize the Bible passage I'm preaching and recite it from memory (messing up from time to time) for the church. This discipline has been enriching for me and inspiring for our people.

Harris: I normally devote most of Thursday, Friday, and Saturday to preparing my sermon. I often work at a table at my local Whole Foods; for some reason I get less distracted there. Studying there also lets me develop relationships with wonderful people outside the church.

Thursday I soak in the text and make random notes about the central idea, illustrations, and questions I have. Friday I try to nail down some kind of basic outline; I usually feel discouraged and unclear by the end of this day. Saturday I take my notes on paper and actually type up a full manuscript. The process of writing it word for word forces me to think more clearly.

I usually wrap up by late Saturday evening. And I think about Andy Stanley, who I've heard finishes his sermons on Friday and takes Saturday off, and I try not to be angry. God bless you, Andy Stanley!

Copyright © 2010 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

M. Leary, co-editor of the excellent online publication Filmwell, has compiled a list of movies with religious themes that he believes would make great fodder for classroom discussion.

“When teaching courses on basic concepts in religious studies and comparative religion, I often find myself wondering what resources the history of cinema has to offer the classroom,” he begins. “I often wish I could . . . integrate more cinema into the learning experience.”

To that end, he has compiled a list of 43 suggestions, beginning with Andrei Rublev (Tarkovsky, 1966), saying “This challenging film tracks a Russian Orthodox iconographer through the turbulent history of Russia, suggesting some complicated things about religion and history along the way. It is a virtual treasury of thoughts on iconography, politics, and religion.”

Others on his list include The Apostle, Babette’s Feast, Ghandi, Lilies of the Field, The Passion of the Christ, and last year’s Coen Brothers film, A Serious Man.

Check out the list, and let us know what you’d add to it – or subtract from it – and why.

Officials at Wheaton College announced this morning that Philip Ryken, pastor of Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, will become the next president of the college.

Ryken graduated from Wheaton in 1988, and received his M.Div. from Westminster Theological Seminary in 1992 and his doctorate in historical theology from the University of Oxford in 1995. He became a pastor at Tenth Presbyterian Church in 1995 and became the senior pastor in 2000 after James Boice died. He and his wife Elisabeth have five children.

Most of his books address faith and the Christian life, such as Art for God’s Sake, The Doctrines of Grace, and Exodus: Saved for God’s Glory. Ryken’s blog posts and sermons can be found on The Gospel Coalition’s site and Reformation 21.

Ryken’s father Leland Ryken is an English professor at Wheaton who recently wrote The Literary Study Bible with his son. The college is celebrating its 150-year anniversary this year and announced last year that President Duane Litfin would retire this summer.

Earlier this week, Baylor University announced that Kenneth Starr would become its next president.

Editor’s note: Christianity Today did not break any embargoes related to this news. CT received notices from three people familiar with the details of this morning’s meeting. CT has changed the time of this post (which reflected when the post was started) to the time when the post was published.

Update: The college posted a press release on its website today, stating that Ryken will begin his new position on July 1.

Update (April 2013): The Orlando Sentinel reports that televangelist Benny Hinn and his ex-wife Suzanne Hinn have re-married.

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On February 1st Suzanne Hinn, wife of famous televangelist Benny Hinn, filed divorce papers in a southern California court. The documents cite irreconcilable differences as grounds for the legal action. News of the divorce has rocked Hinn`s worldwide following and has already been used as fodder for critics of the controversial healer`s ministry.

Don Price, senior advisor to Mr. Hinn, stated in a Press release that “Pastor Benny Hinn and his immediate family were shocked and saddened to learn of this news. The couple has been married for more than 30 years, and although Pastor Hinn has faithfully endeavored to bring healing to their relationship, those efforts failed and were met with the petition for divorce that was filed without notice.”

Confidential sources have informed Christianity Today that the Hinn marriage has been in trouble for a long time and that the divorce proceedings were no shock to Benny Hinn. CT tried unsuccessfully to reach Benny Hinn and Mr. Price for comment.

Suzanne Hinn is being represented by Sorrell Trope, a legendary figure in divorce litigation. His previous clients include Cary Grant, Rod Steiger, Nicole Kidman and Elin Nordegren, wife of Tiger Woods. Mrs. Hinn was unavailable for comment. The couple was married in 1979 and have four children.

Lee Grady, contributing editor of Charisma magazine, told CT that the impact of divorce on Benny Hinn’s ministry will depend on the nature of their marriage problems. Grady also said that the charismatic world “has been shaken to its core in recent years by a number of high-profile leaders who haved divorced or had moral failures. Many charismatics I know are troubled by this, and they feel it is time for deep introspection, repentance and a rejection of the shallow, celebrity Christianity that has typified much of our movement.”

Reporting by James A. Beverley

Your Church magazine asked its Editorial Advisors and Contributing Editors how pastors, business administrators, and executive pastors can lead well amid the changing realities in 2010–and here’s what they said.

Guard against the growing risk of embezzlement

One major church insurer logged 32 embezzlement-related claims in 2009, up 12.5 percent from its recent annual averages. “Regrettably, financial misconduct tends to be more predominant in economic downtimes,” says David Middlebrook, another Texas-based attorney specializing in church law.

Fraud experts often refer to a three-legged stool for embezzlement risk: opportunity, need, and organizational ethos. Opportunity often is born out of non-existent or poorly managed financial controls. A variety of new resources help churches set proper controls, including The Essential Guide to Church Finances (2009, Christianity Today International–the parent ministry of Your Church), and Weeds in the Garden (2009, NACBA Press), as well as guidance from organizations like the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability (http://www.ecfa.org/PDF/BestPractices-Churches.pdf).

In terms of need, church leaders must pay attention to hardships in the lives of their employees. The most common scenario for church fraud involves longtime employees who face an unexpected financial stress–a job loss for a spouse or an extended illness with hefty medical bills for a family member. Some studies suggest the average tenure of a church employee who commits fraud is seven years, Sommerville says, and recent headlines reflect that. “These employees don’t start off thinking they’re going to steal,” he says. “They think they’re going to borrow from you and pay you back when things improve.”

A strong organizational ethos that encourages transparency and requires high standards also helps prevent financial misconduct. “It really is helpful if churches create this above-reproach, ethical standard, something they continually talk about and include in their code of ethics–’We’re going to operate above reproach in every area of ministry from the senior pastor and board on down,’ ” Sommerville says. “If that’s the atmosphere, fellow employees may catch and report them.”

Re-think investment strategies

For decades, Wall Street touted the stock market’s ability to deliver annual average returns of 10 percent for those who invested the majority of their assets in equities. Even in years when the stock market ebbed rather than flowed, the thinking went, most losses would be regained–and then some–in future years. Tempted, many churches participated, abandoning more conservative approaches that delivered modest earnings but protected principal, says Mike Batts, founder and managing shareholder of a Florida-based CPA firm serving nonprofits.

But the stock market’s topsy-turvy past three years has made it “obvious you can lose substantial principal,” Batts says. That’s a problem, especially when investment earnings fund specific ministry initiatives. During the past 18 months, endowments on average have lost 30 percent of their value, Batts says, shrinking revenue for ministries and creating relational and publicity challenges for churches with donors.

Batts says church leaders should consider returning to less risky investment strategies, such as certificates of deposit and treasury securities held to maturity. While these investments may average only two percent or three percent returns in the current market, the principal remains protected. Before doing so, though, Batts says church leaders need to realize that in some investments, values aren’t fully realized until a maturity date, meaning an early cash-out to address a cash crunch can result in lower-than-expected returns. “You must plan your liquidity so that you don’t need that money,” he says.

Middlebrook says another common pitfall for churches is investment schemes. Richard Hammar, Your Church’s senior editorial advisor and the senior editor of Church Law & Tax Report and Church Finance Today, recommends the following steps to avoid financial scams:

• Use an investment committee to make recommendations regarding the investment of funds;
• Create an investment policy that prohibits investments in specified instruments or programs;
• Avoid speculative or risky investments. If a proposal sounds too good to be true, it probably is;
• Avoid investing in companies or programs in which a board member has a personal interest. Such investments are not always inappropriate. But they demand a higher degree of scrutiny.

Read this article in its entirety at YourChurch.net.

Historian Randall Balmer has spent decades studying the movement in which he was raised. His new book, discussed by Stan Guthrie and John Wilson, offers a sharply argued critical overview.

The Catholics In Media Associates 17th Annual Mass and Awards Brunch, to be held February 28, will honor The Hurt Locker with the CIMA 2010 Film Award, and Glee with the CIMA 2010 Television Award, it has been announced.

The CIMA 2010 Board of Directors Award will be presented to Sr. Rose Pacatte, FSP, MEd Media Studies, director, Pauline Center for Media Studies (PCMS) and media literacy education specialist, film and television journalist and author.

One need not be a Chamber—to be Haunted – One need not be a House – The Brain has Corridors—surpassing Material Place –

Far safer, of a Midnight MeetingExternal GhostThan its interior Confronting – That Cooler Host –

Emily Dickinson’s words in this poem offer severe insights into the psychological torments within the human mind—”Ourself behind Ourself.” It’s a theme that has been paramount in literature and art ever since: the depths, mysteries, and hidden horrors not of some external phantom, but of our internal self.

Martin Scorsese’s Shutter Island is a film about the war within. It’s a deeply psychological, feverish madhouse of a movie that relentlessly pushes its protagonist to the brink of sanity, and forces us to question our own distinctions between things like heroes/villains, real/unreal, and order/chaos.

Based on the 2003 novel by Dennis Lehane (Mystic River), Shutter follows two fedora-clad U.S. marshals in 1954 New England as they investigate the disappearance of an inmate at a hospital for the criminally insane—a hospital conveniently located on a craggy, mysterious island cut off from the mainland.

Leonardo DiCaprio plays the lead investigator (and the film’s focal point), Teddy Daniels, who has his own secrets, demons, and delusions that become more and more evident the longer he stays on Shutter Island. As he and his partner Chuck (Mark Ruffalo) go about uncovering the secrets of the island, they encounter a motley crew of bizarre/creepy/insane characters, including a duo of the hospital’s top physicians (Ben Kingsley and Max von Sydow at their malevolent best), lots of disturbingly off-kilter mental patients, and a smattering of guards, orderlies, and hospital administrators. It doesn’t take long for things to really get crazy, and for Teddy to realize two things: 1) He has no friends on the island, and 2) No one is going to let him leave.

“Shutter Island” is an appropriate name for the place. It’s closed off. Patients are locked in. Once you get there, you don’t leave. And so what starts as a simple investigation for Teddy ultimately turns into a desperate attempt to get off the island before he loses his mind—or worse.

With Shutter Island, Scorsese takes a leap into an unfamiliar genre—vintage film noir—though it’s not altogether a departure from his larger oeuvre. As a filmmaker, he is first and foremost an interpreter of America. That is, the gritty, violent, darker-than-we-seem nation still trying to reconcile its religious commitment to order and its baser, instinctual urges to dominate and “take what’s ours.” His films—particularly Mean Streets, Taxi Driver, Raging Bull, Goodfellas, and The Departed—can be seen as statements about unresolved American tensions and anxieties (particularly through the eyes of men), and the noir explorations in Shutter Island fit squarely into this theme.

Film noir has come to be known as one of the most distinct and “wholly American” film styles that grew out of a specific reflection of post-war American culture. The genre developed in the 1940s and 50s and featured expressionistic lighting, urban settings (often wet city streets at night), influence from hard-boiled detective fiction (James Cain, Raymond Chandler), depraved anti-heroes, moral ambiguity, fear of sexuality/women, and a pervasive feeling of dread/fate/alienation. Each of these qualities speaks to the preoccupations and anxiety of post-war America, and each is present in spades in Shutter Island.

DiCaprio’s character, Teddy, is a WWII veteran who was among the troops who liberated the Dachau concentration camp. In war he saw unimaginable horrors and encountered all sorts of evil, the most unsettling of which was found in his own heart. Back home, in the white-picket fence perfection of post-war Waltons America, Teddy had a lovely wife (Michelle Williams), three beautiful children, and a job in federal law enforcement—protecting “the good and the right” values that ensured America would never fall victim to the depraved temptations of other 20th century superpowers.

Alas, the post-war dream was marred by an insistent, unsettling anxiety—a Cold War/technocratic/Freud-era fear that the good vs. evil binary might in the end betray those who wholeheartedly subscribed to it. As a genre, noir was always about throwing such binaries into question, and asking the probing, frightful question of what might lurk inside the human heart—inside the “corridors surpassing material place.”

Shutter Island is all about the visceral, head-scratching embodiment of questions like this. Who is crazy? Am I crazy? Or are they crazy? As the film progresses and becomes more complicated and twisty by the minute, these questions press on us like the needle-sharp migraines Teddy suffers from.

Scorsese’s direction in Island—particularly his pacing—is purposefully discombobulated, and the overall “I don’t know what’s going on but it can’t be good” hallucinatory mood is aided by dreamlike bursts of color saturation and an eclectic, ominous soundtrack (with music by modern composers like John Cage, Ingram Marshall and Brian Eno). All of this well serves the insane asylum motif of the film, which can be enjoyed on the level of mystery/thriller but also as a deeper, more thought-provoking examination of both existential issues (are we inherently evil?) and societal problems (mental illness and institutionalization).

The film’s deeper side comes largely through the compelling performance of DiCaprio, who—as in previous Scorsese collaborations like Gangs of New York and The Departed, and in his 50s era tour de force Revolutionary Road—plays a man longing for stable domesticity and moral order amidst circ*mstances that harshly and relentlessly suggest that the world is a dark, unruly place.

“God loves violence,” one character tells Teddy. “There is no moral order at all. There’s only, ‘can my violence conquer yours?'”

It’s a philosophy of life that the twentieth century—with its nukes, holocausts, and social Darwinism—seemed to support. And yet as much as mid-century film noir mistrusted man and placed him in the grime of his own wretchedness, it rarely threw in the towel on moral order. In those old hardboiled crime films, wrong choices always ended up costing. Sin always had its wages, and depravity was never abandoned as an unconquerable part of the self. And neither is it in Shutter Island.

Talk About It

Discussion starters

1. Who, if anyone, comes out of this film with integrity and morality intact? Can we discern the heroes from the villains?
2. What do you think Scorsese is trying to observe about good and evil in Shutter Island?
3. What do you make of the last line of the film?

The Family Corner

For parents to consider

Shutter Island is rated R, mostly for language (quite a few f-words) and violence (rather light by Scorsese standards, but still present in the form of a few disturbing images). There is also a very brief scene of male nudity (prisoners in a dark cell). In general, the film’s dark thematic content and pervasive sense of dread makes it a “mature audiences only” type film. Definitely not for kids.

Photos © Paramount Pictures

Copyright © 2010 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

Political Advocacy Tracker is a roundup of what Christian activist organizations have been talking about over the past week.

What the Right Believes

Leading up to an annual conservative gathering in Washington, D.C., political advocacy groups signed a new manifesto affirming core principles.

The Mount Vernon Statement was signed by scores of conservative groups that agreed on basic values including limited government, individual liberty, free enterprise, strong national security, and the “defense of family, neighborhood, community, and faith.”

The document comes as groups ready for the Conservative Political Action Conference, organized annually by the American Conservative Union. Signatories included representatives from socially conservative groups such as the Family Research Council (FRC), Concerned Women for America, and Focus on the Family Action, as well as groups representing libertarians, tea party organizers, and national security hawks.

“This is a significant moment as social, fiscal, and national security conservatives come together to declare the importance of partnering to defend our nation’s founding principles,” said Tony Perkins, president of Family Research Council.

Tom Minnery of Focus on the Family Action explained his support, saying “government has grown way outside its proper sphere by getting into moral and spiritual realms, such as redefining marriage [and] encouraging women to leave their children at home and go into the work force.”

“As a nation, a people, and a culture, in so many ways it seems we are floundering. We have lost our sense of our American identity,” said Erica Wanis of the Center for a Just Society.

But not all conservative advocates were excited about the document. “Writing and signing statements is all the rage in conservatism today, “wrote Elijah Friedeman on the American Family Association blog. “But Americans don’t want or need more words that will soon be forgotten. Americans want action. … Unfortunately, too many conservatives wax eloquent on their values and principles rather than actually changing America.”

Not That There’s Anything Wrong with That

Opponents of same-sex marriage found themselves in a tricky rhetorical position as they tried to criticize some unique gay rights proponents without overtly criticizing them.

Last week, the

San Francisco Chronicle

Proponents of Prop. 8 reacted by avoiding the issue; rather than saying Judge Walker was unfit to rule because he is gay, they said he has been biased, perhaps because he is gay.

Mario Diaz of Concerned Women for America said, “I know that the judge’s sexuality is not really important legally. His biased, activist and unlawful decisions are the real problem and not his motives. But it sure helps to explain a lot. The ‘appearance of impropriety’ is just too strong.”

Bruce Hausknecht, judicial analyst for Focus on the Family Action, said that Walker’s rulings in the trial “have all revealed a bias in favor of the anti–Prop. 8 plaintiffs. … [T]he source of that bias could be the judge’s sexual orientation. At this point, that’s just speculation. The fact that the bias exists is what’s important.”

Tony Perkins of FRC also had to strike a balance as he critiqued former Vice President Dick Cheney. Cheney told ABC’s This Week that it was time to reconsider the military’s “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” policy. “When the chiefs come forward and say, ‘We think we can do it,’ then it strikes me that it’s … time to reconsider the policy,” said Cheney.

Perkins, who liked everything else Cheney said in the interview, said that his “facts were wrong” because only one member of the Joint Chiefs said that changing the policy would be the right course, and he expressed this view as a personal belief. Perkins said that other Joint Chiefs have said that changing the policy “would be ‘disruptive,’ and could lead to weakenened national security.”

Hope for Deficit Reduction?

Most advocacy groups agreed that the federal deficit needs to be reduced, but few expressed the slightest hope that it will.

Tom McClusky of FRC Action pointed out that neither party has learned how to control spending. Like most conservatives, McClusky opposed the stimulus, but he agreed with some recent criticism from Democrats who note that Republicans who opposed the stimulus take credit for stimulus-funded projects in their districts.

“I can certainly understand why any politician, seeing a very large pile of cash sitting there for the states to grab, wants to bring home some bacon to their constituents,” said McClusky. “But that cash belongs to the taxpayers in the first place, and that type of thinking … shows [that the Republicans] learned nothing.”

President Barack Obama is the real problem, according to Andrea Lafferty of the Traditional Values Coaltion.

“What America needs is tax cuts, a halt to binge spending, and a reduction in the control that the federal government has over our economic well-being,” said Lafferty. She has little hope that this will occur, as she sees President Obama as someone “whose vision is for a federal government that controls literally every aspect of our lives.”

Chuck Colson also saw little reason to expect a change in policy.

“Something has to give,” Colson said. “My fear is that this ‘something’ will be the sanctity of life. Absent a political solution, the responsibility will fall on the elderly to get out of the way—either voluntarily or by restrictions on medical care for which they are deemed, by some government agency, to be eligible—or not.”

Leaders of Sojourners agreed that the deficit must be reduced, calling budgets “moral documents” and saying reducing the deficit is “a moral imperative.” Military spending is one area that could be cut, according to the Sojourners blog.

Muslim solidiers and a murder trial attract attention

The American Family Association (AFA) cannot be accused of shying away from controversial statements that may irritate or offend those who disagree. This week was no exception.

Bryan Fischer reiterated his call to ban all Muslims from the U.S. military, this time focusing on Shari’ah law, saying it requires them to kill non-Muslims in Muslim countries.

“American Muslim soldiers have no problem killing people unless they happen to be Muslim people,” said Fischer. “We cannot allow soldiers to decide when they will destroy America’s enemies and when they will destroy American soldiers instead.”

Fischer also weighed in on the case of Amy Bishop, a professor who was arrested for killing three colleagues at the University of Alabama. Prosecution later discovered that had she killed her brother in 1986 but was not charged for the murder; Fischer said she should have received the death penalty then.

“The fact that [the prosecutor] failed to do his Christian, legal and civic duty then resulted in the murders of three more innocent victims in 2010,” he said.

The AFA also ended its boycott of Pepsi Co., which began in 2008 when Pepsi donated $500,000 to Human Rights Campaign and Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays.

Odds & Ends

Evangelicals for Social Action (ESA) alerted its members of controversies over defense contractor Blackwater, which has been accused of hiring sex workers under euphemisms such as “morale welfare recreation.” ESA encouraged members to contact their representatives and to support organizations that work with victims of sex trafficking.

FRC’s Ken Blackwell wrote in an op-ed that the U.S. is enforcing an anti-Christian pogrom, which he defined as “anti-Jewish raids by Cossacks and others in czarist Russia.” Christians are being systematically attacked, Blackwell argued (albeit by liberals, not by Cossacks). He said President Obama is not protecting their rights.

Doug Carlson of the Southern Baptist Ethics and Religious Liberty Commissiondescribes Dawn Johnsen, the newly appointed head of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, as a “rabidly pro-abortion law professor” who will not work for common ground.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s claim this week that his nation is capable of making a nuclear weapon did not sit well with some advocacy groups. The American Center for Law and Justice said in a petition that Iran has repeatedly threatened the U.S. and Israel and has continued its nuclear program despite international sanctions, and that the U.S. should not dialogue with the country.

Richard Land of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission agreed, saying President Obama should “lead the world in implementing strict and harsh sanctions” against Iran.

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Related Elsewhere:

Earlier Political Advocacy Trackers are available on our site. Christianity Today also follows political developments on the politics blog.

The main characters in Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight saga practice sexual abstinence, but Wheaton College theology professor Beth Felker Jones doesn’t think Christians should celebrate the books as a model for chaste romance just yet. At first glance, it seems like there’s a lot to like about the romance between Bella, an average teenage girl, and Edward, a 108-year-old vampire with a Victorian sense of morality—he insists that Bella marry him before consummating the relationship. Felker Jones wrote the book Touched by a Vampire: Discovering the Hidden Messages in the Twilight Saga (Multnomah, 2009) to examine the themes of sexuality, gender, salvation, and eternal life wrapped up in the love story of Bella and Edward. She spoke with Christianity Today about the appeal of the books, their approach to sexuality and Mormon theology, and why they should concern Christians. Note: Some spoilers ahead.

There seems to be a level of obsession with the Twilight books and movies. What makes them so appealing to so many readers?

The series has to do with things most people care about: the meaning of life, love, romance. We’re looking for something to make life meaningful and exciting and interesting and worthwhile.

Was there anything of spiritual merit that surprised you in the books?

What’s most interesting and, arguably, most worrisome about the books is that they’re full of spiritual themes. The Twilight universe is a moral universe. The love story may be what captures readers, but the stories are also powerful because they deal with what it means to be good and to try to overcome evil. They also deal with the longing human beings have to be transformed, to be set free from our limits and weaknesses. All of this could open up quite a conversation about the gift of salvation.

How do the books answer this question of being set free from our limits and weaknesses? How do they contradict a Christian view?

In the Twilight saga, Bella finds freedom from her limits in her transformation from a weak human being to a powerful, immortal vampire. She longs for this transformation because she wants to be with Edward, but she also wants to escape her clumsiness and the vulnerability that threatens to separate her from Edward. Transformed Bella—beautiful, strong, vampire Bella—is the Bella who is finally at home in the world and with herself. This longing for transformation points to the desire that we all have to be set free. We’re broken and vulnerable, and we long for meaning. But where Bella finds her “salvation” in Edward, Christians recognize that true salvation is found in Christ.

These books seem to have provoked less criticism from Christians than did the Harry Potter books, their predecessors in the fantasy fiction craze. Why do you think that is? How would you compare the two series?

In some ways it baffles me. I happen to be a Harry Potter fan, and of course those books aren’t perfect, but there are some interesting things going on with love and morality. Maybe it’s just the obvious use of magic in the Harry Potter books [that bothers people], but I think the Twilight books could be more of a concern, as they shape a worldview that values this obsessive love. Maybe the Mormon themes in the books let Christians in the door without complaining and don’t make Christians stop and ask better questions about what’s really going on.

John Granger wrote in Touchstone magazine that the Twilight novels are “an allegory of one gentile seeker’s coming to the fullness of Latter-day Saint faith and life.” Are there any particularly Mormon themes in the books that might be at odds with a Christian worldview?

I read a quotation the other day from a Mormon woman suggesting the books could be used as a Mormon evangelism tool, saying, “Perhaps we could say to people, ‘We can promise you will be together forever and no one will even have to bite you.'” I can see this theme of eternal family as the place where salvation happens as an “in” to Mormon evangelism, as it is very much part of Mormon thought. As is the way goodness is approached in the books: the vampires in the books are struggling against their darkest desires [to drink human blood] and they talk quite a bit about their souls—whether they have souls, and whether God might reward them for their attempts to be good. What’s missing is the Christian gospel, the idea that we can’t overcome our darkness on our own, that no matter how hard we work to be good, we’re going to fail, and we’re going to need Jesus. The picture of goodness in the books is a salvation by works. “I’ll try hard enough and perhaps God will be pleased.”

While some Christians mightcommend the books for their strong stance on abstinence, marriage, and family, you write that you’re hesitant to praise the books’ approach on these issues. How is the series contributing to a conversation on abstinence?

I heard Christians saying, “The characters are waiting until marriage, isn’t this great!” I think the themes of abstinence, marriage, and family give us a glimpse into the author’s Mormon worldview in which marriage becomes a kind of salvation. Family is tied up in salvation as well, and while the abstinence message is there, the books are still very much erotic reads and are not going to help readers, particularly young readers, to think about the good place of sexuality in God’s plan. Instead, we just have this intensely erotic, desperate waiting, a waiting that, oddly enough, Edward is totally in charge of. Bella has no interest in it, and she puts all the responsibility on his shoulders. There’s no aspect of togetherness. When they do marry, I worry about the way their sexual relationship works and what that looks like in contrast to what a good marriage should look like.

What aspects of Christian sexuality is Twilight failing to present?

In the books, sex is portrayed only as a pleasure to be deferred. In Christian thought, it’s so much more than that. It’s a good gift from God, and it is a pleasure, but it’s also meant to show fidelity between a husband and a wife, to teach us about faithfulness, to teach us about loving God, and to be a reflection of God’s faithfulness to the world, instead of just this desperate waiting.

You examine the portrayal of gender roles and the “harmful feminine stereotypes” represented by the main character, Bella. She is supposed to represent the everygirl, but the books focus on her weakness and constant need to be rescued by strong, perfect males. As Christians, who desire the fullness of God’s intentions for us as men and women, how should we consider the books’ models for male and female identity?

Bella’s character is pretty much flattened into someone who loves Edward and needs him and centers her life on him. God creates us with gifts and talents and vocations and we need to honor those by developing them and not just erasing ourselves for the sake of some kind of love relationship. And it can put completely unfair pressure on men to be this kind of superhero, to be the savior of women. What we expect to find from love in real life is another human being who’s struggling with us through sin, trying to love God and trying to help us do that, too.

In your book, you describe how in good fiction “the story world changes our world.” What new possibilities or ideas does the Twilight saga offer for Christians?

It suggests that we build our desires around this fantasy relationship between Edward and Bella. I hope that we would make more room for the biblical story to shape what we hope for and to see what God has done for us. [The Bible] has an account of love that is intense and wonderful but can really fulfill us, instead of leaving us disappointed cynics when we realize that we’re not going to find a glittering Edward.

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Touched by a Vampire is available at ChristianBook.com and other book retailers.

Christianity Today reviewed the first and second Twilight movies. Laura Leonard wrote about the series for the women’s blog.