Each of us must ask ourselves, “Do I despise God’s daily bread by grasping greedily [and often anxiously] for something more?” Of course, this doesn’t mean earthly riches are inherently sinful (see 1 Tim. 6:17–19). We must, however, recognize that the manic pursuit of them is symptomatic of a deeper discontentment with our divine lot. We do well to be watchful and to recall the words of Jesus: “It is more blessed to give than to receive” (Acts 20:35).

You might have heard about Forrest Fenn’s hidden treasure. In 2010, the millionaire Fenn squirreled away a chest full of valuables worth an estimated $1 million. Hundreds of thousands of people searched for the buried treasure, which wasn’t discovered until June of 2020 by a medical student named Jack Stuef. As exhilarating as I imagine a treasure hunt would be, Fenn’s quest also proved deadly. Five people lost their lives in the process of trying to find the treasure—one of them was even a pastor.
When the quest for temporal goods is viewed as ultimate, it becomes an all-consuming cancer. Wisdom says that greed for unjust gain takes away the life of its possessor (Prov. 1:19). Our Lord Jesus listed greed among the pollutions of the human heart, right along with murder and adultery (Mark 7:21–22, NASB). In Luke, He prefaced the parable of the rich fool by saying, “Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions” (Luke 12:15). The original word behind covetousness is the same word used for greed in Mark 7:22. It’s the Greek word pleonexia, which is defined as “the state of desiring to have more than one’s due,”1 or “a strong desire to acquire more and more material possessions or to possess more things than other people have, all irrespective of need.”2 Thomas Aquinas simply defined covetousness, or greed, as “the immoderate love of possessing.”3
But have you ever heard someone confess to being greedy? Perhaps more importantly, have you ever asked God to forgive you for greediness? Based on how infrequently this particular sin is named, one gets the sense that the immoderate love of possessing is something we rarely, if ever, struggle with. This would have surprised the Apostle Paul, who wrote under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit that in the last days men would be lovers of money (2 Tim. 3:2).
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Written by Bruce A. Little |
Monday, January 3, 2022
To be relevant Christians must re-package the message by being creative, reimagining the message. For years, Christian churches and organizations resisted the temptation to make the message of Christ sound up to date. However, beginning in the middle of the 20th century that all began to change. At first, the message was not changed, it was how it was package for the world’s consumption or remaking the environment in which the Gospel was proclaimed. A new face or atmosphere was given to Christianity.

Culture in the United States shows definite signs of decay and decline. The cultural artifacts lack humanity-affirming values as they erase the lines of reality and its moral structure. Unfortunately, a growing number of Christians are contributing to the decay as they have fallen into the trap of trying to be relevant where being creative overrides the good, the true and the beautiful. The defense is they are just trying to connect with modern man to give him the Gospel—being relevant, I think is the term. Who is this modern man but the one who despises truth?
Christian books flood the market touting some new creative way to do church, use technology, promote evangelism, or calls to jump on the Woke bus, reimagining Christianity to join the social justice warrior’s vision.
Many of the new voices trade on “creativity” or “reimagining” the Christian message. Meanwhile, the Christian community is to accept all of this as being right with Christianity simply because nice Christians are saying it. After all, they are our leaders, and they are the elites so to speak. Of course, we all know that is a fallacy. This is not saying, however, there is no sincerity or real interest in reaching the world for Christ. However, sincerity is not the measure of what is right, Truth is. It is true Christians should find ways to make the Truth applicable to the audience at hand. However, that is not the same thing as re-packaging the Christian message to make it attractive to the world. The message of Christ is grounded in history, which is to say it is attached time and place, it is a part of history. It is a fixed message, and one must be very careful indeed when attempting to reach the world by a clever re-packaging of the message. It was the Enlightenment that consigned the past to irrelevance. It was the new that was to be embraced while the past was criticized as outdated, immature, and without relevance for the present. This is one of the objections by the moderns regarding the Christian message. Believing what the world says, there are those who say that the old way of speaking about the Christian message is not relevant to the modern man.
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Pastor Brant Bosserman provided members of his congregation with a letter to employers requesting a religious exemption to possible COVID-19 vaccine mandates. Knowing this may be a scenario many Christians face in coming months, Rev. Dr. Bosserman has made his pastoral letter available to others, to serve as a template on how and why such an exemption can be requested.

Today the Food and Drug Administration granted full approval to the Pfizer vaccine for COVID-19. In the lead-up to that news, US Surgeon General Vivek Murthy said such an approval will likely increase vaccine requirements—especially in places of business and educational institutions. Not unexpectedly, the societal discussion around this topic has been extremely contentious, and there are sincerely held and well-informed opinions on both ends of the spectrum about whether or not to get the COVID-19 vaccination.
That discussion may take a new turn if policies begin rendering the vaccine mandatory. In arguing the Bill of Rights before the first session of Congress, James Madison asserted that the “rights of conscience” is something for which “the people in America are most alarmed.” What was civilly true of our founding has, for a long time, been religiously true too. The Protestant and Presbyterian tradition to which I belong has valued the liberty of conscience both in society and within the church. We value this because it is an important and distinct teaching of the Holy Scriptures (see Liberty of Conscience: The History of a Puritan Idea by L. John Van Til). As citizens of this nation, and more importantly as Christians many will need to determine in the days ahead whether they will get the vaccine if business or institutions make than mandatory. As we do, we must leave room for disagreement and in the spirit of Christian charity, we must be content to let others act according to their own conscience as we all seek to inform and be informed.
Recently, Pastor Brant Bosserman – a pastor in the PCA, adjunct professor of philosophy at Northwest University, and a guest contributor to Gentle Reformation—provided members of his congregation with a letter to employers requesting a religious exemption to possible COVID-19 vaccine mandates. Knowing this may be a scenario many Christians face in coming months, Rev. Dr. Bosserman has made his pastoral letter available to others, to serve as a template on how and why such an exemption can be requested. I offer it here acknowledging that not everyone will agree with the need for such a request, but also recognizing each Christian’s right to sincerely hold their religious convictions.
Dear Employer
In my capacity as a Minister in the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA), I am writing on behalf of ________________________ to ask that his/her religious exemption from receiving Covid-19 vaccination be honored by your organization.
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