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God Owns Starbucks

The Huffington Post reports, “A Christian pastor is asking customers to boycott Starbucks due to the company’s support of a bill to legalize gay marriage in Washington state…”

A few people have asked me about this boycott so I thought it might be helpful to explain why I’m drinking a big, steaming cup of Starbucks right now.

We live in a culture that is rejecting the Bible more and more.  Our main task is to make disciples.  Laws and company policies will change at a fundamental level when the leaders of those companies believe in Jesus. Boycotts are usually promoted by people who never actually lead anyone to Christ.  They are not mainly concerned with making disciples, they’re just mad that people don’t agree with them, they pine for the good old days, and they’re cranky and judgmental. I would tell that person to get his eyes back on the ball.

But that’s a church mission strategy argument.  I realize the main question is on a different level.  People want to know if the Bible requires us to boycott Starbucks, or if God would be pleased by a boycott, etc.  I’ll handle the question in two ways, first to expose the impossibility of boycotting culture, and then to make a Biblical case.

First, if we have to boycott Starbucks for supporting homosexuality, then we have to boycott culture. Will you buy a sandwich from a Hindu?  Will you wear a shirt that was made in a communist country?  Will you interview your taxi driver to make sure his wife didn’t have an abortion?  It’s ludicrous logic.  Maybe we should boycott freeways since they were Hitler’s idea.  Or maybe I should refuse to use a calendar since the day and months were named after Greek and Roman gods?  It’s fine with me if someone want’s to boycott a company for any reason – I personally don’t like shopping at Eddie Bauer because my grandpa knew Eddie’s dad and he told me stories.  But we live in a culture filled with non-Christians.  The Bible never tells us to avoid their shops. If the Bible did require this, we would have to live on the moon.

But here’s the Biblical argument.  God made those coffee beans and there’s nothing anyone can do to take away God’s ownership of them.  He made the beans and it glorifies Him when we enjoy those beans.  I get this argument from Romans 14 and 1 Corinthians chapters 8 and 10 where Paul addressed the issue of meat sacrificed to idols.  In Paul’s day, pagan religions sold the meat they used in religious ceremonies.  Some Christians thought it was wrong to eat that meat, assuming it had been tainted by evil.  But Paul says, “Eat whatever is sold in the meat market without raising any question on the ground of conscience. For ’the earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof’” (1 Co. 10:25-26). His point is this: no false religion can take meat ownership away from God.  He is always the ultimate owner.  Even if it was cooked on the alter of a false god, it’s just good barbecued meat, who cares if a fool cooked it.  Eat it and enjoy it.  It doesn’t matter that it was used in a religious ritual, and it doesn’t matter that you’re giving your money to a false religion when you buy it.  That meat belongs to God.  That’s why my belly is filled with Starbucks right now.  It’s God’s coffee and I don’t care who sells it to me.

But there’s a wrinkle.  In those same three Bible passages on meat sacrificed to idols, Paul talks about a “weaker brother.”  He’s talking about someone who doesn’t understand that meat can’t be tainted by evil.  If this confused believer sees you eating it, he might violate his own conscience by eating it too.  He might do something that he thinks is sinful because he sees you doing it.  He is “weaker” in the sense that his conscience is weak; he does what he thinks is wrong.  It is always sinful to do what we think is sin, even though it might not actually be sin.  ”Whoever has doubts is condemned if he eats, because the eating is not from faith” (Rom. 14:23).  So, says Paul, don’t cause your brother to stumble in his faith by leading him to do something he thinks (mistakenly) is wrong.  ”It is good not to eat meat or drink wine or do anything that causes your brother to stumble” (Rom 14:21).

The challenge of that verse is that people notoriously abuse it.  It’s usually those cranky, judgmental types who say, “See, you can’t drink Starbucks because someone might stumble.”  So then you have to think: Is it actually possible that a person might violate his weak conscience if he sees me drinking Starbucks?  Personally, I don’t see that happening.  More likely, the person who thinks it’s sin will be the cranky, judgmental type who will get mad at me for disagreeing with him. That’s different! He won’t be likely to violate his conscience by drinking; he’ll be likely to criticize me for being a liberal.  And that’s a great time to go buy a Grande Caramel Macchiato and guzzle it right in front of him.  Because he’s adding a command to Scripture.  ”Thou shalt not drink Starbucks.”  Tell that person to stuff it and mind his own business.

Study, Study, Study

D.A. Carson in today’s “For the Love of God” post…

“There is no long-range effective teaching of the Bible that is not accompanied by long hours of ongoing study of the Bible. Effectiveness in teaching the Bible is purchased at the price of much study, some of it lonely, all of it tiring. If you are not a student of the Word, you are not called to be a teacher of the Word.”

Painted Nothings

Of the Boy and the Butterfly by John Bunyan

Behold, how eager this our little boy
Is for a butterfly, as if all joy,
All profits, honours, yea, and lasting pleasures,
Were wrapped up in her, or the richest treasures
Found in her would be bundled up together,
When all her all is lighter than a feather.

He halloos, runs, and cris out, “Here, boys, here!”
Nor doth he brambles or the nettles fear:
He stumbles at the molehills, up he gets,
And runs again, as one bereft of wits;
And all his labour and his large outcry
Is only for a silly butterfly.

Comparison

This little boy an emblem is of those
Whose hearts are wholly at the world’s dispose.
The butterfly doth represent to me
The world’s best things at best but fading be.”
All are but painted nothings and false joys,
Like this poor butterfly to these our boys.

His running through nettles, thorns, and briers,
To gratify his boyish found desires,
His tumbling over molehills to attain
His end, namely, his butterfly to gain,
Doth plainly show what hazards some men run
To get what will be lost as soon as won.

John Bunyan

I Will Bear It

Excerpt from Spurgeon’s For the Sick and Afflicted:

No affliction from which we suffer has come to us by chance. We are not left to the misery of believing that things happen of themselves, and are independent of a divinely controlling power. We know that not a drop of bitter ever falls into our cup unless the wisdom of our heavenly Father has placed it there. We are not even left in a world governed by angels, or ruled by cherubim; we dwell where everything is ordered by God himself. Shall we rebel against the Most High? Shall we not let him do as seemeth good in his sight? Shall we not cover our lip in silence when we know that the evil is of the Lord? Shame upon us, if we be his children, if this be not the prevalent spirit of our mind-”It is the Lord, let him do what seemeth him good.” Moreover, we should not only bear all things because the Lord ordains them, but because he orders all things for a wise, kind, beneficent purpose. He doth not afflict willingly. He takes no delight in the sufferings of his children. Whenever adversity must come it is always with a purpose; and, if a purpose of God is to be subserved by my suffering, would I wish to escape from it? If his glory will come of it, shall I not even crave the honor of being the agent of his glory, even though it be by lying passive and enduring in anguish. Yes, beloved, since we know that God can only grieve his regenerated creatures for some purpose of love, we should willingly accept whatever sorrow he pleases to put upon us. And we have his assurance, besides, that all things work together for our good. Our trials are not merely sent with a good object, but with an object good towards ourselves, a design which is being answered by every twig of our heavenly father’s rod. “The cup which our Father hath given us, shall we not drink it?” It is healing medicine and not deadly poison, therefore let us put it to our lips without a murmur, ay, quaff it to its very dregs, and say, “Not as I will, but as thou wilt.”

Cherishing the Cross

Need of Jesus (from the Valley of Vision collection of prayers)

Lord Jesus,
I am blind, be thou my light,
ignorant, be thou my wisdom,
self-willed, be thou my mind.

Open my ear to grasp quickly thy Spirit’s voice,
and delightfully run after his beckoning hand;
Melt my conscience that no hardness remain,
make it alive to evil’s slightest touch;
When Satan approaches may I flee to thy wounds,
and there cease to tremble at all alarms.

Be my good shepard to lead me into the green pastures of thy Word,
and cause me to lie down beside the rivers of its comforts.

Fill me with peace, that no disquieting worldly worldly gales
may ruffle the calm surfaces of my soul.

Thy cross was upraised to be my refuge,
Thy blood streamed forth to wash me clean,
Thy death occurred to give me a surety,
Thy name is my property to save me,
By thee all heaven is poured into my heart,
but it is too narrow to comprehend thy love.

I was a stranger, an outcast, a slave, a rebel,
but they cross has brought me near,
has softened my heart,
has made me thy Fathers’ child,
has admitted me to thy family,
has made me joint-heir with thyself.

O that I may love thee as thou lovest me,
that I may walk worthy of thee, my Lord,
that I may reflect the image of heaven’s first-born.

May I always see thy beauty with the clear eye of faith, and feel the power of thy Spirit in my heart,
for unless he move mightily in me
no inward fire will be kindled.

The Power of the Cross

Oh, to see the dawn
Of the darkest day:
Christ on the road to Calvary.
Tried by sinful men,
Torn and beaten, then
Nailed to a cross of wood.

CHORUS:
This, the pow’r of the cross:
Christ became sin for us;
Took the blame, bore the wrath-
We stand forgiven at the cross.

Oh, to see the pain
Written on Your face,
Bearing the awesome weight of sin.
Ev’ry bitter thought,
Ev’ry evil deed
Crowning Your bloodstained brow.

Now the daylight flees;
Now the ground beneath
Quakes as its Maker bows His head.
Curtain torn in two,
Dead are raised to life;
“Finished!” the vict’ry cry.

Oh, to see my name
Written in the wounds,
For through Your suffering I am free.
Death is crushed to death;
Life is mine to live,
Won through Your selfless love.

The Power of the Cross by Keith Getty & Stuart Townend

Gorgeous Flip

Bad Shepherds

sheepCornerstone’s elders spend a lot of time talking about shepherding.  I’m not claiming to be good at it, but we’re passionate about it.  We want to shepherd well, and we want to equip lots of people to shepherd well.

When the Bible talks about leadership, it often uses the image of shepherding.  A shepherd with his flock implies all the things we normally associate with leadership (like management, authority, and so on), but it also implies something about relationships (provision, protection, and intensely personal care).

One of the major problems in ancient Israel was bad leadership.  Ezekiel 34 is one of the classic texts against bad shepherds in ancient Israel.  I scanned the prophets for God’s criticism of leadership and then developed these categories of emphasis:

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