Should We Make Purple?



Let's do it MY way!



My first ministry out of seminary was in suburban Washington, D.C. The D.C. metro area is some kind of political town! I guess it was here, in the early 80s, that I really cultivated an interest in all things political. I can't remember a time when Washington was more entertaining than it is right now.

And, by the way, don't get too excited about any headlines that finally come out about the debt ceiling and reduced spending. No proposal is going to do anything about insane, indefensible spending. "Shall we cut off half an inch of the lion's tail, or a whole inch?" Be sure, either way, the lion will still have a very long tail and he will be exceedingly annoyed.

People will complain, "Why can't they just get along and compromise?" The thinking is, "You prefer Red and you prefer Blue. Just get together and make some Purple!"

But that's not the nature of our system. We have, by design, an adversarial form of government. And it is absolutely terrible. That's right. We have a terrible form of government. It's just that it's so much better than whatever is second best.

The leaders in our government are not going to "get along." And they shouldn't. They are adversaries. Our system is not about compromise; it is about prevailing. People want to say the government is broken. I think it's working exactly as it was designed.The left and the right represent two very different views of the role of government and have two very different visions for the future.  Now, I won't bore you with my description of these distinctions because I'm really on the way to making another point.

In the spiritual realm, we live in an adversarial system. Our adversary (Satan) has a different view for our future than does God. The Apostle Peter warns us, "Your opponent the devil is prowling around like a roaring lion as he looks for someone to devour" (1P5:8,GW). Are we to get along with our adversary and just compromise? Of course not. Rather, Peter says, "Be firm in the faith and resist him" (1P5:9,GW).

Please understand. I'm not urging the demonizing of political opponents. Our grasp of political truth is not nearly as clear as is our grasp of spiritual truth. But when it comes to the matter of the spiritual walk, our attitude should be the same as the politician running for office, "I'm in it to win it." We do this by trusting our advocate, Jesus Christ, not compromising with our adversary.

Jim Wallace Steps Down

July 10 is Jim Wallace’s last day with us. He has served as our Minister of Music for 32 years. He and I have served together for 20 years. Twenty years!

I can almost say that he (and Dean) has been an institution. But that wouldn’t be quite accurate or fair. I think of institutions as immovable and unchanging. Jim has proved to be neither.

Church music has changed profoundly in the last 30 years. It may not be an overstatement to say that there has never been a 30 year period in all of the history of the church that has seen more change in church music than has the last 30 year period. And the fact of the matter is, many church musicians simply got stuck in whatever type of music they were trained in. They couldn’t adapt. Couldn’t change. And couldn’t lead their people to adapt and change.



Jim Wallace



Jim has.

He should be respected for that. He has taught us to worship and encounter God in so many new and fresh ways. We have been exposed to so many different kinds of music and worship styles because Jim never stopped learning and never stopped teaching us about worship.

Thank you Jim! You will be missed.