Blog - Page 278 of 318 - John H Armstrong

Two Consistent and Courageous Senators with Totally Opposite Views on the War in Iraq

By John Armstrong|2007-02-05T19:59:28-06:00February 5th, 2007|Categories: Politics|

John McCain and Russ Feingold could not be more different about their views of the War in Iraq. Feingold is prepared to cut off all funding, to bring the troops home now, and thus to stop the President’s direction. McCain is just the opposite in his view. He believes we actually need even more troops than the “surge” calls for. He has been saying this for well over a year, long before most in the Senate or elsewhere even discussed it. But there is one thing that unites Feingold and McCain. Both are consistent and both are bold in stating their views. They are not willing to spin this war in the air waiting to see how much they can defend or attack and then get away with it. Both men have the courage of their convictions, which may explain why they stood side-by-side in their campaign for financial reform legislation just a few years ago. (Their famous bill, known as the McCain-Feingold Act, proved to really solve almost nothing even though it tried to present some real solutions in the area of campaign […]

Two Great Coaches and Their Faith in Christ

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:23:47-05:00February 3rd, 2007|Categories: Evangelism|

The Super Bowl is finally upon us, with kickoff at 5 p.m. CST tomorrow afternoon. I have made my loyalty to the Chicago Bears widely known. What I haven’t commented upon previously is that both the head coaches of the two teams in this Super Bowl are wonderful Christian men. Tony Dungy (Colts) and Lovie Smith (Bears) are not only the first African-American head coaches to take a team to the Super Bowl but they are open and clear about their profession of faith in Jesus Christ as their Lord.

Coach Dungy lost a son, James, to suicide just a year ago. His story is powerfully related to that personal tragedy and how his faith helped him through it. Coach Smith grew up in a strong Christian home and speaks of his mother’s influence on his faith living in the deep South. These two men are not theologians so do not watch their stories with a critical eye. Watch them to hear a simple, clear testimony from two prominent men, who have been given a very big stage this week. Both men […]

If You Want to Serve the Public You Better Show Up for Work

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:23:47-05:00February 2nd, 2007|Categories: Politics|

A recently announced conservative candidate for president is Senator Sam Brownback (R-Kansas). Brownback is openly proclaiming the need to restore God-centered values to the nation. His announcement speech almost sounded like an evangelistic appeal. But there is a major flaw in Brownback’s values and public performance. He has been virtually absent from Congress while he has been running around the country trying to build momentum for his candidacy in 2008. One has to wonder what values Brownback really holds to when Congress adjourned on October 4, 2006, and then began a new session in early January of ‘07. During that time period, of about eleven weeks, Brownback needed to show up for only a few days of work, but he skipped town entirely.

Then, when Congress began meeting again in 2007, Brownback missed all of the votes in the first full week of the new Congress. What is even more amazing is that this value oriented conservative senator was too busy to participate in the important senate discussions regarding ethics reforms. And Sam Brownback hasn’t been working much this week either, missing all […]

Surviving the Internet's Ability to Make Private Statements Public in an Information Age

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:23:47-05:00February 1st, 2007|Categories: Culture|

I am still frankly amazed at how comments can be taken, and then interpreted out of their context, and spread via the Internet in a matter of seconds, creating a controversy that should not even exist. Truly this powerful medium, which has done so much good and will continue to do great good, can be used for malicious talk and character assassination. Anyone with a computer can say about anything they want and seemingly without personal consequences. I am reminded, as a Christian, that I am responsible for every word I speak, or write, and that I will answer to God. I am also aware that far too many people make far too much out of very little and the Internet feeds this frenzy.

I often remind folks that if Martin Luther were alive today many Christians would consider him crude and a man with poor tastes in both drink and culture. But since he is dead he is a hero to many. He was, like you and me, a mortal. He was also a very flawed but profoundly interesting mortal. I […]

The Super Bowl and Christian Freedom

By John Armstrong|2007-01-31T10:03:06-06:00January 31st, 2007|Categories: Culture|

This is, as millions already know, Super Bowl week. Nothing is hyped all across America quite like the Super Bowl. This game has reached amazing proportions when it comes to the viewing audience and massive commercialization. It is a stunning piece of popular culture and one doesn’t know whether to weep about it or celebrate. Some pietistic folk see this as clear evidence that there is little real difference between us and the ancient Romans in the Coliseum. Others think this is the greatest day of the whole year with the biggest event of all time at 5 p.m. Everything, so it seems, virtually comes to a halt for the Super Bowl.

Here in Chicago the event is, of course, really big with the Bears in the game. So, how important are the Bears this Lord’s Day? Well, big enough to alter many churches and their plans for the day. What few churches still have services of any sort on Sunday evening will cancel them this week, with only a few exceptions. One priest, whose parish does have an evening Mass (as […]

Institute for Religion and Democracy

By John Armstrong|2007-01-29T19:54:33-06:00January 29th, 2007|Categories: Politics|

Several months ago I was invited to serve on the board of the Institute on Religion and Democracy (IRD). Frankly, I was stunned by this invitation. I will attend my first meeting in Washington, DC, in a few months. IRD’s purpose statement says that it is: (1) An ecumenical alliance of U. S. Christians, (2) working to reform their churches’ social witness, in accord with biblical and historic Christian teachings, (3) thereby contributing to the renewal of democratic society at home and abroad. IRD board member Michael Novak has written that Alexis de Tocqueville observed in the 1830s that "the first political institution of American democracy is religion" (which of course meant the Christian religion at that time). Novak speaks, in a statement such as this, of the bedrock vision of IRD. I deeply share this vision thus my desire to work with and serve alongside the staff of IRD in Washington.

IRD was born among mainline churches and Christians who felt that the social witness of their respective churches had been captured by people who denied the strong link between public […]

True Worship Feeds Both the Mind and the Heart

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:23:47-05:00January 28th, 2007|Categories: The Church|

The famous Anglican archbishop William Temple provided perhaps the best definition of worship that I have ever read:

Worship is the quickening of the conscience by the holiness of God, the feeding of the mind by the truth of God, the purging of the imagination by the beauty of God, the opening of the heart to the love of God, and the devotion of the will to the purpose of God.

I think Temple’s definition is both full and theologically sound. I have discovered, over many years of worship in some of our most conservative evangelical churches, that true worship is quite uncommon. We put so much stress on “feeding the mind by the truth of God” that we do next to nothing to “purge the imagination by the beauty of God.” Our theology is so Word centered, in the very narrowest of senses, and our doctrine of creation is often limited to debates about the length of days in Genesis and the age of the earth, so we miss beauty. We treat physical matter, drama and art, as irrelevant to worship. […]

The Korean Revival and the Ministry of UBF

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:23:47-05:00January 27th, 2007|Categories: Missional Church|

About eighteen months ago I had a lovely married female graduate student, a mother of two young children, who took several of my classes at Wheaton Graduate School (apologetics and spiritual formation). She had grown up in a tent-making missionary family in the Hyde Park section of Chicago. She learned a missional lifestyle from her father and mother in their home. As she listened to my classes and read the assigned reading she came alive to the subjects and the impact of the ideas.

This student’s dad, a professionally trained man, felt a call to leave his native Korea many years ago in order to evangelize in the United States, especially at the University of Chicago. (He has recently uprooted himself to move to Boston to begin a new mission church work all over again. The courage and faith of this man humbles me to even think about this move.) My student did her B.A. at the University of Chicago before coming to Wheaton Graduate School. She will receive her M. A. in May. She had witnessed incarnational evangelism as practiced in […]

Alexander Hamilton on Danger and Disgrace

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:23:48-05:00January 26th, 2007|Categories: History|

I admit the statement struck me immediately with a sense that I needed to reflect on it further. I thought about it for some time today and then took down my dictionary to think about it more deeply.

The words I refer to are those of founding American father Alexander Hamilton, who created our central treasury, and in some ways gave to us the concept of a central federal government that developed after the Civil War. Hamilton is not, by any stretch of imagination, my favorite founder. But here is his quote that stopped me in my tracks today: "A nation which can prefer disgrace to danger is prepared for a master, and deserves one."

Disgrace? The word means a loss of favor or a downfall from a position of respect. It also refers to a cause of reproach or a thing or person involving dishonor. So, if I read Alexander Hamilton correctly, he is saying a nation that prefers to become a reproach, or to be deliberately deceived, or to willfully dishonor itself rather than face a serious or […]

To Surge or Not to Surge: The War in Iraq and Our Future

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:23:48-05:00January 25th, 2007|Categories: Politics|

The general public, if they still care at all, watched President Bush’s State of the Union address on Tuesday evening, January 23. Almost everyone had an opinion, especially about the Iraq portion of the speech. Glenn Beck, the conservative talk show host on CNN, said 85% of the speech was “bull-crap,” the typical political stuff one expects. In some ways I agree. He also noted that the part of the speech that really mattered, about 10% of it, was the controversial part. This was the part about Iraq and America’s long term security in the world. Beck applauded the president and noted some amazing lines in the speech that were a clarion call to the leadership of this country to not run from the battle where the front is now engaged, namely in Iraq. I have wavered on this point but I am now convinced that this is true. I am not sure that we can win in Iraq. I am severely critical of how we pursued this battle for the last two years or so. I think military historian Thomas Ricks, in the […]