Good deacons are humble, and sacrificial, and creatively constructive—and they’re also deeply happy. Their humility is a happy humility. Their sacrifices are glad sacrifices. Their initiative is not just willing, but cheerful and eager. They have found, like the Servant they follow, that joy not only fuels ministry to others, but blossoms from that ministry.

As surprised as we might be by divisiveness in the church, and as uncomfortable and maddening as it may feel at times, such cracks in the walls have dogged us from the beginning.
The kinds of cracks have varied from age to age and culture to culture, but give any congregation enough time—even the best of them—and cracks will emerge. They’re side effects of making covenants with fellow sinners—as unpleasant as they are unavoidable. It’s just part of keeping a home in a fallen world.
Many have tried hard to diagnose and treat the current cracks in our walls—politics and elections, mask mandates and rebellions, racial disparity and superiority, men’s and women’s roles in the home and beyond, domestic abuse and other moral failures, and so on—but many of them have overlooked or marginalized a missing ingredient to harmony. In fact, I can’t help but wonder if the wildfires in some pews are as fierce and contagious as they are because this piece seems so small in many of our eyes.
When God planted the first churches, he knew the cracks he’d find. He wrote them into our stories, in fact, because he knew that cracked but loving churches served his purposes better than ones with brand-new walls and pristine floors. He had planned the cracks, and he had plans for the cracks, and one of those plans was called deacons.
Strong Enough to Help
We first encounter deacons during a meal (which, as any normal family knows, is when fights often break out). As the early church began to meet and grow, Greek-speaking Jews who had been scattered outside of Israel (“Hellenists”) returned to Jerusalem to join the church and follow Jesus. After a while, though, they came and complained to the Hebrew-speaking apostles because Greek widows were not receiving the food they needed (Acts 6:1).
Urgent needs like this, as any church knows, require time and attention, pastoral sensitivity, and careful follow-through. This meant the leaders would have less time and attention for teaching and prayer, and they knew the church would suffer even more if that were the case (Acts 6:2). So, the apostles called the church to appoint seven men to make sure all were fed well. And because they did, “the word of God continued to increase, and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem” (Acts 6:7).
How much or little we think of diaconal ministry today rests, in significant measure, on what problem we think those first proto-deacons were solving. Was this merely a matter of entrées and sides for some lonely and vulnerable women, or was the church facing a deeper, more sensitive threat?
Matt Smethurst, in his introduction to deacons, draws our attention to the greater dangers hiding beneath the dining tables:
How our churches react to conflict can make all the difference in whether our gospel witness is obstructed or accelerated. Acts 6 is a story of church conflict handled well…The seven weren’t merely deployed to solve a food problem. Food was the occasion, sure, but it wasn’t the deepest problem. The deepest problem was a sudden threat to church unity. (Deacons, 44, 52)
Cracks were suddenly surfacing and spreading. How could the church win the war for souls if there were wars within her walls? How could the word run if its people were mired in swamps of bitterness? The church didn’t merely need better waiters; it needed peace and healing. It needed men strong and wise enough to help mend fractures in the family.
Giants Bowing Low
Many might hear deacon and immediately think of dull or menial tasks that few people want to do—building maintaining, budget crunching, nursery cleaning, furnace repairing, meal serving. They might imagine a sort of junior-varsity team that relieves the pastors of lesser work. When the apostles saw those seven men, however, they saw something different in them—a stronger and more vibrant force for good, a noble and vital ministry.
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Written by Benjamin T. Inman |
Friday, February 24, 2023
We need the outwards means that Christ actually uses. Where has he put his promises? How does he give us the benefits of redemption? It is appalling to assert that sanctification by faith urgently needs something other than what Christ has appointed. This is about how is it even possible, and how is it actually accomplished– that faith in Christ can deliver us from fruitless lives of being “anything but faithful, self-denying, cross-bearing Christians.”

That was Mardi Gras, Fat Tuesday. My special needs daughter’s trainer gave her some red beads in the morning. That was kind of one, and delightful to both. We didn’t discuss penitential practices, or the twisted reliability of the-day-before-lent. Just a day on the calendar. Just shiny beads. Yes, I thanked her.
The next day I drove into town, past the Anglican Church: “Ash Wednesday: Drive-Thru hours 12-1 pm and 4-5 pm, Service at 5:30.” I’m new in this town and haven’t yet met the priest. I have only done some drive-by praying. I have no idea what to make of that sign. Somebody’s circus, somebody’s monkeys. For that clergy in that building, it was most certainly Ash Wednesday. What does it mean for them on Thursday?
Thursday is the day when I think about my two dear Anglican brothers. I think. I do not text the thought, though it would make them laugh. I am not making light of their discipleship. I know they think of me on this day too– fond thoughts edging over towards how immovable I am on this stuff. It’s me; it’s Thursday; it’s not a big deal; it just won’t budge.
But then, I read this from a fellow minister in the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA). He and I have communicated about my concerns before. He wrote this originally for all and sundry, though now he publishes it again for the members of his new congregation. He explains that ashes for repentance is something people actually did when open fires were ubiquitous to civilization. Perhaps today we would follow their example by licking an electrical outlet. Or we could anoint with embalming fluid. He carefully acknowledges that what we now do at the drive thru only emerged in the 11th century. He then goes on to speak of embodied rituals and their necessity for our sanctification.
He is not fooling around; he knows that it is an old practice, not an ancient practice. Accordingly, his reflection produces a flexible conclusion: this is like something seen in the Bible, and a lot of professing Christians have done it in the past– so, it is okey-dokey but not mandatory for congregations to do it now. Perhaps his session promulgates this ritual for those under their care. Perhaps he performs it in his office as their pastor. Perhaps some of them do not participate. This is an elective practice for Christians. No, not in the Bible, but cherished by some people who have high regard for the Bible. It is more than naming a day, but also less.
What’s The Problem?
Easter. Lent. Fat Tuesday. Ash Wednesday. I even made up my own name for Thursday. This is not about naming days. This is not about despising disciples in earlier centuries from whom we have received the legacy of their tenacity. I am not scandalized or deprived of a gleam of my thankful wonder by thinking that the people who blessed me did some stupid stuff. I am encouraged to think some folks may regard me similarly. I’m not bent out of shape because “that is not a very presbyterian thing to do.” Let all the jerseys be so smeared with mud and blood, that we can’t discriminate with our comments from the sidelines. There are differences and details, but don’t muck around like this:
We live in a culture that is constantly barraging us with rituals. We are moved along like sheep by the media and other forces. We participate in the Super Bowl, an event that is laden with ritual. We do Fourth of July, Presidents’ Day, Memorial Day – and most of these rituals involve opening up the pocket book to buy things. We participate in sporting events of all kinds, which are rituals. We do Valentine’s day, Mother’s Day, and Father’s Day – all rituals. And yet even though our secular culture hits us with rituals all day long, seven days a week, and twice on Sunday, many of us Protestants and Evangelicals are wary of rituals in the church! In light of everything the culture uses to shape and form us, what we need in the church is not less rituals but more! We need rituals to shape and form us to counteract the forces in the culture which are forming us into anything but faithful, self-denying, cross-bearing Christians.
Ritual is a profound and trendy topic. My daughter is a professional philosopher, and she has schooled me a bit. It is of interest to professional philosophers lately. She doesn’t think my views of intinction or the call to worship or Matthew 18 are just persnickety opinions about details and criteria. She and I both are nodding with this impassioned paragraph about those cultural rituals. The real-world power and trajectories are weighty.
Most certainly, believers need something “to counteract the forces in the culture.” Romans 12:1ff and similar texts indicate that just such “greater than” power and influence is necessary in sanctification. The PCA’s view of wholesome religion thrums with the same urgency: “What doth God require of us, that we may escape his wrath and curse, due to us for sin?” (SC 85).
That dire question has a stout and energetic rejoinder. “To escape the wrath and curse of God, due to us for sin, God requireth of us faith in Jesus Christ, repentance unto life, with the diligent use of all the outward means whereby Christ communicateth to us the benefits of redemption.” No, under the pressures of our wicked society, we do not need to multiply liturgical rituals.
We need the outwards means that Christ actually uses. Where has he put his promises? How does he give us the benefits of redemption? It is appalling to assert that sanctification by faith urgently needs something other than what Christ has appointed. This is about how is it even possible, and how is it actually accomplished– that faith in Christ can deliver us from fruitless lives of being “anything but faithful, self-denying, cross-bearing Christians.”
This is not about being unpresbyterian. This is not about naming days.
What’s the Other Problem?
I am heartened about the point of agreement: we want Christians to live worthy of their calling. I am distressed at this out-of-the-ancient-blue prescription. We agree on how high the stakes are, and the necessity of every believer laying his cards on the table. Our Standards exempt no believer. There is no Christian freedom athwart this point: God requires “the diligent use” by everyone. Sanctification is serious business and it must contend with the atmospheric influence of the world, the flesh and the devil– peer pressure, systemic influence and worldly rituals. Given the glory of sanctification in Christ, of course there is urgency.
How then can a faithful pastor present something so powerful as optional? We must counteract the worldly rituals– on that we agree. If more rituals are a necessity for the spiritual good of every sheep, how could a pastor fail to urge participation on each and every one? How could one leave them bereft without more rituals? Isn’t that neglect? I am ashen faced at the thought of telling my bi-polar nephew that his meds are optional.
I am aghast at the illogical tolerance that wafts from mixing this 11th century smoldering into this 21st century muck. “Ash Wednesday and the imposition of ashes is one of those helpful rituals that push against the world, the flesh, and the devil.” Helpful? That’s an anticlimax. One of? Apparently, there are others to add. The imposition of ashes by a minister of the gospel is not for every Christian. Are we at the post-modernism part yet?
Does this mean that– which rituals are indifferent, but we must multiply other rituals? Do we need to make things more fitting for people who are ash intolerant? Is this the church’s task, inventing rituals? Thoughtfully the church describes the dire situation. Winsomely, she exposits the theological provisions. Then she earnestly urges, “Don’t just stand there; do something.” And she comforts: “Don’t worry, we’ll make something up.”
Given that worldly rituals are a malicious influence, surely the Word of God provides all the counterweight needful for life and godliness. According to our Standards, are there rituals with such influence? Are rituals so prescribed in our Standards? How on earth can Christians be shaped more by Christ in heaven (Col 3:1ff) than by the rituals of the society we inhabit?
This is about how Christians are enabled to honor Christ with faith and repentance in the world. This is not about naming days in the calendar. This is about the vitals of religion.
Benjamin T. Inman is a Minister in the Presbyterian Church in America and a member of Eastern Carolina Presbytery.
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Written by Scott N. Callaham |
Saturday, July 9, 2022
The Creator-King chooses to redeem his creation by creating a new people for himself. He elects them, saves them, imputes his own righteousness to them, blesses them, and lets them come to him. That’s not all. Mirroring the final act in the grand narrative of all of Scripture, Psalm 24 then shifts scenes. When the Creator-King has accomplished his purposes in redemption, he comes to dwell with his redeemed people, who receive him as their King of glory.

“Who is God?”—Ask such a question of any group, and you will likely receive a range of responses. A few respondents might reject the validity of the question and simply deny the existence of God. Most, though, will likely offer religiously-tinged answers. “God is all-knowing,” they might say. He is “all-powerful, all-loving.” A few more “all” expressions might then give way to the use of “omni,” like “omnipresent” or even the somewhat cumbersome “omnibenevolent.” Finally, the “alls” and the “omnis” may crescendo into an assertion of God’s perfection. What often gets lost in the course of the ensuing conversation is that stacking up thesephilosophical adjectives misses the point of the question.
Consider possible responses to “Who is the President of the United States?” Should someone answer with the words “important” and “well-dressed,” it is doubtful that the respondent actually knows much about the American presidency. In addition, despite the fact that these words accurately characterize whomever may hold that office in a general sense, it is safe to assume that the person who speaks this way and the sitting President are not mutually acquainted. Similarly, philosophical answers to the question “Who is God?” not only initially cast doubt upon whether the respondent knows of God, but also in the end upon whether the respondent actually knows God at all.
So, back to the question: “Who is God?”—or, as the psalmist puts it: “Who is this King of glory?”
The Creator-King
1 The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein, 2 for he has founded it upon the seas and established it upon the rivers.
Creation theology includes a number of “givens” that many in atheistically- and scientifically-minded Western cultures find nearly impossible to accept. Among these “givens” is the unmediated, direct action of God in the creation of the world. Contrastingly, in Scripture God’s direct agency in creation is never in any doubt. God created on a grand scale; his “let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens . . .” speech act (Gen 1:14–16) ignited untold trillions of fusion reactions so that stars would blaze their heat and light throughout the universe. God also created on an intensely intimate scale; he fashioned the first man from dust and the first woman from that man (Gen 2:7 and 22). These acts are “givens” behind poetic allusion to the creation of land and sea in verse 2.
All the above having been said, it is important not to miss that the “givenness” of God’s creation appears after the “for” at the beginning of verse 2. This “for” means that the logic of Ps 24:1–2 is: because verse 2 is true, verse 1 is the necessary result. In other words, the fact that God is Creator (verse 2) entails that God rules over all (verse 1—His title as “King” appears later); the Creator is creation’s rightful ruler.
Even so, English word order might lead the reader to think that “the earth” is the focal point of the verse, and therefore that “the earth” is the psalmist’s major concern. Not so. Instead, the original language places the Lord in focus. The beginning half of verse 1 is an assertion that it is the Lord who owns the earth “and the fullness thereof.” The latter half then explains what this “fullness” (“that which fills it”) is: “those who dwell therein.” Therefore, since it is the Lord who rules the earth and those who dwell therein, whatever powers those “dwellers” may exercise, they are not the rulers of the earth. If any doubt on this point were to remain, verse 2 then falls like a hammer blow. Not only does verse 2 employ the “for” logic mentioned above, but it also emphasizes “he” in the original language beyond the capacity of an English translation to reflect. The cumulative effect is something like “It is the Lord who rules the earth, not those who dwell therein, because he created it!” Sandwiching humanity between two successive focused mentions of the Lord, the psalmist puts “those who dwell” in the world firmly in their place.
The One Who Seeks God
3 Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? And who shall stand in his holy place?
In light of the absolute sovereignty of the Lord laid out in verses 1 and 2, verse 3 asks two questions for which the reader already knows the likely answers. That is to say, no one would dare to do these things! No one would climb the hill upon which the Lord’s Temple would stand, and then brazenly enter into its sacred precincts uninvited. How could a mere creature of dust stand before the Lord in his holy place? Yet verse 4 jolts the unsuspecting reader by claiming that there is, in fact, such a person:
4 He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not lift up his soul to what is false and does not swear deceitfully.
“Clean hands” refers to righteous behavior (see Job 17:9) and is surely opposite to the idea of having blood on one’s hands (see Isa 59:3, Ezek 23:37): a biblical metaphor that has fittingly come over into English to expose obvious guilt. “Pure heart” then alludes to righteous motives (see Prov 20:9). Jesus’s pointed assertion of adultery taking place within one’s heart (Matt 5:27–28) underscores that a person can technically have “clean hands” and yet lack a “pure heart.” Indeed, these hand and heart standards in this first half of verse 4 are rather difficult to attain.
The second half of verse 4 drills deeper into the soil of what constitutes “clean hands” and a “pure heart.” The amplifying illustration of one with “clean hands” appears second; this person “does not swear deceitfully.” Entering into agreements (the purpose of swearing) with no intention of keeping one’s promises displays a character completely opposite that of the Lord, who never breaks his covenants with his people (see Judg 2:1). Such a “dirty-handed” person could never ascend the Lord’s hill and stand in his presence. After all, even before starting the ascent, this promise breaker has no intention to follow through on any vows made to the Lord.
Next, verse 4 describes what the opposite of a “pure heart” looks like; it is a person who “lifts up his soul to what is false.” Every other time the Psalms mention the lifting of the soul, the action has to do with worship of the Lord (see Ps 25:1, 86:4, 143:8). Accordingly, as in Jer 18:15, committing “false” worship acts can entail a false object of worship: any or all of the world’s imposter false gods. That said, humans can also try to worship the Lord in a false manner. The prohibition against taking the name of the Lord “in vain” in the Ten Commandments uses the same term for “what is false” as in Ps 24:4.
We see that in just a few words, Ps 24:4 lauds a person of righteous behavior and righteous motives. Breaking promises and either worshiping other gods or presuming to worship the Lord wrongly would conflict so much with this person’s character that these displays of contempt toward God would be unthinkable. So, of course, such a righteous person would be welcome in the presence of the Creator-King.
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