No Exceptions Ministries, Inc

Like most people, I suppose, most of the criticisms leveled at me are, if I admit it, quite fair. Am I too quick to argue and defend my ideas rather than listen? Sure. Do I have a — completely undeserved — aristocratic bent from time to time? Yes, I own that. Do I love words to such an excessive degree that I frequently use far too many of them to make my point when fewer would do perfectly well? Ok…ouch! But yes, this is 100% true. It all the more shocks me then that the criticism most often charged against me is not at all true: “Matt, you’re just cherry picking scripture to make God in your image rather than allowing yourself to be confirmed to His.” The accusation is indeed so inaccurate that I, perhaps naively, wonder if it is because I have not adequately explained myself. So let me give it a whirl… ALL SCRIPTURE [γράφω - graphē] IS INSPIRED (literally ‘god-breathed’) is a far cry from equal, inerrant, infallible, or universally applicable. Scripture never bestows those a

Beloved, oh how we love our counterproductive extremes!  Rather than find the truth that lies most often in the middle, we seesaw back and forth from one excess to another, missing out entirely on the balance the Spirit is ever-faithful to reveal.  Perhaps this is nowhere so obvious as it relates to ‘charging’ for anything in connection to ministry services.   Side A:  Insists that a professional clergy class, separate and distinct from the common/lay practitioner, is a God-ordained necessity for the functioning of the church.  To justify their wage, they typically require advanced education, special anointing or spiritual powers, and a veneer of selflessness that makes those same laymen count their lucky stars that they aren’t called upon to suffer as a vicar of Christ.   Side B:  Its adherents are equally insistent in their belief — that the ministry of the gospel should never have a price tag.  To expect compensation or fiscal participation from others is seen as greed and tantamoun

Perseverate - to repeat or prolong an action, thought, or utterance after the stimulus that prompted it has ceased.  To extend focus past the point of productivity.   To ignore the evil in the world is a form of denial no less destructive than the opposite extreme: to perseverate on it.   Our 24/7 news cycle and its nearly instantaneous flow of information in real time is the perfect storm for perseveration.  Packaged for the express purpose of captivating — and maintaining — attention, the barrage of media assaults our senses without reprieve.   Until we shut it off.   So what then is a person of conscience to do?   The answer, I believe, is found in pondering these two passages in tandem: Matthew 6:22-34 (NASB) 22 “The eye is the lamp of the body; so then if your eye is clear, your whole body will be full of light.  23 “But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!  24  “No one can serve two

Are labels themselves the problem or is it our tendency to use them to define us - and justify our actions to both ourselves and others - rather than as an aide to understanding?  Conversation necessitates agreed upon definitions, which in a sense are just ‘labels’ by another name.  Without them, meaningful discourse is next to impossible.  Spend any length of time on social media and that lesson will be obvious.  So perhaps it’s our intended use of the labels that warrants reconsideration more so than the concept of labels itself.  Maybe, just maybe, all labels should have the implied limitation: in so far as conscience allows. For example… My political label is conservative.  As my voting record, candidate preference, and ideological outlook reflect, that is a fair definition of my politics.  But my ‘conservatism’ must bow to the supremacy of Christ.  So the label is then valid only in so far as conscience allows.  When conservatism attempts supremacy over Christ; my ultimate, truest