Uri Brito

On October 12, 2023 By Uri Brito In Culture 1

Abraham Kuyper Versus the Modernists

What we are experiencing in our times is merely a replaying of classic higher criticism. In the 19th century, Abraham Kuyper argued that modernist scholarship was an attempt to regard themselves as holy. Their worldly wisdom would uphold their elite status because their ethical values were free from religious control.

Kuyper noted that they think they have found the truth, but they have attributed “reality to a mirage, a fairy tale.”^a He further argued that the way out of this moral chaos is to make Christian education indispensable to the success of the Church. Since the state was not interested in the biblical concept of truth, “Christians would have to establish their own schools.”

He knew that modernism could only breathe if it kept the lower middle class distant from the political process. In those days, people experiencing poverty remained far from political engagement since most were not allowed to vote because they did not own land. Therefore, Kuyper entered the political scene eager to appeal to the lower middle class. He knew that the poor in the Netherlands wanted to preserve tradition and conserve Christendom in their communities. He called them to enter the political stage to exorcise the modernists from both Church and State.

Our scene today offers us an opportunity to abandon the antipathy towards politics by encouraging the Church to re-enter the stage of history and fight for society’s good; to see their Christian task as far more than merely a spiritual pursuit of heaven, but to see the Church as the fundamental means by which society is transformed.

The modernists today want nothing with truth but opine from the comfort of tenured status, and we must now seek to leave them to their own devices and begin anew with biblical institutions that presuppose the Triune life at every point of human endeavor.

James E. McGoldrick, Abraham Kuyper: God’s Renaissance Man, 56 (back)

On September 21, 2023 By Uri Brito In Culture 1

How to Offend like a Christian

There is no way around it; there is no shortcut to escape it unless you want to forsake it, but the Gospel offends (I Pet.2:7-8). You must drink it straight. For the Christian, the alternative to living out a Gospel that offends is to live as if the Gospel does not matter.

We can move through our workday cavalierly playing the nominal Christian game, remaining quiet when you should have stood firm; you can let Uncle Joe splurt his vitriol against the church and be a good girl, not causing offense anywhere, and masking our way through the next crisis. Yes, we can gain the world’s approval, but we lose our souls.

Is it or is it not the power of God unto salvation and foolishness to the world (Rom. 1; I Cor. 1)? The way you live determines one of these two choices.

So, how do we intentionally live a Gospel that touches the core of anthropology? That hits the center of human pride? That strikes at the root of secular practice? The first way to live a Gospel that is a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense; to practice those Christian rituals that birthed the Christ-community in the first century. And they were the “foolish” rituals of hospitality, friendship, and sacraments.

The Early Church had many failures, but they hosted each other, they loved each other, they suffered well, and they broke communion bread amid famine, peril and sword. These practices toppled an empire, turned the world upside down, gave Nero nightmares, and kept Pilate and his wife awake at night. How is that for a Gospel offense?!

Suppose the cultural forces continue to move away from the authentic values of the Church. In that case, members of this royal offense-saturated community must see the Church of our Lord as the headquarters of counter-cultural measures.

This is no time to rest or to play nice with anti-Christian politicians and lawmakers. We must restore our sense of the good by loving one another and surrounding ourselves with a Creed that cannot be torn by the mobs but is embraced by a genuine community of believers. We must return to those principles that formed us into the unstoppable empire that grew from 12 to billions. We need to declare these things loud and clear.

“We believe in God the Father Almighty!” but they will say, “How dare you!”
“Maker of Heaven of Earth!” but they will say, “That’s not science!”
“And in Jesus Christ our Lord!” and they will say, “That’s not diversity.”
“Who shall come to judge the living and the dead!” and they will retort, “Nobody can judge!”

Every time we get together for coffee, eat with our neighbor, talk about the goodness of God, and practice holy habits, we live the Gospel in word and deed. We are embracing a different creed and causing offense to the worldly dogma.

No, there is no way around it. The Gospel offends! It afflicts the comfortable and comforts the afflicted. Any other message is false and has no power or salvation.

On September 20, 2023 By Uri Brito In Culture Like

The Necessity of Messy Homes

For years, we have had children and adults roaming our house who do not share our last name. We have adopted the ancient ritual of feeding people, and they, in turn, have invested in feeding us when they bring some of their delicacies. The entire exchange is glorious and delicious.

We have folks weekly for psalms and dessert, and then we have our share of friends and guests staying with us overnight or having meals with us. Eggs, chips and dip, toast, butter, coffee, casseroles, pizza, whiskey, beer, soups, and none of those things in that exact order. The whole thing is a glorious mess of humans and food, the kind of mess that makes the kingdom of God glorious. We love the entire process, which creates a sense of normalcy that is utterly uncomfortable in our culture.

The discomfort stems from a sense of unrealistic neatness that keeps the world from being hospitable. Many evangelicals have fallen into similar traps. Christians wish they had more hospitality, but they do not believe it is sustainable if they have a steady number of guests in their homes.

Our general policy is that we clean when guests come over, which means we clean often, and with our eager tribe of children, cleaning is much more effective, especially with Sargent Wifey.

But the expectation–one I am constantly adjusting to as a Latin man who grew up with impeccable clean homes–that things must always be a certain way and that the home must maintain the correct Asian procedural methods of a certain short lady (how racist of me!) is utterly unrealistic and squashes the culture of hospitality.

The reality is that a home without guests doth not spark joy in the kingdom. Of course, I am not suggesting we forsake those cleanliness habits, but I do suggest we loosen our commitment to certain habits as prerequisites for hospitality.

Think of how many opportunities have been missed because we assumed that such and such a person would look down on us if they saw our house a certain way, the clothes on the couch, the boys’ room in utter chaos, etc.? How many opportunities have been ruined for sweet and intimate communion because we are not “spontaneous” kind of people?

Two additional footnotes are important in this discussion. The first is that if dads are not invested in the cleaning, let their steaks burn a thousand deaths. And the second is that there are seasons when such things need to be paused temporarily. Discernment must come in handy.

I remember a time many years ago when I was having a conversation with a young family with two little kids. The conversation was about our church’s focus on hospitality, to which the father replied: “One day, we will have time for that.” Now, I was quite a young pastor in those days, and my boldness was low on the Richter scale, but today I would simply say, “If you wait for the right time when the “right” time comes, it will always feel like the wrong time.” That’s the case because hospitality is built on the foundation of crying babies and broken toys. It’s a gift you learn to give others with plenty of practice.

Sometimes, when I am in the middle of a deep thought concerning the ontological Trinity with my guests, while 15 kids run around us and in the middle of a very “important” point I was trying to make, my littlest one interrupted with an urgent call from nature. I commented that parents have conversations in fragments in such settings. That should be absolutely normal and expected.

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On September 13, 2023 By Uri Brito In Church 2

Baptismal Notes on the Westminster Confession

Our Reformational baptismal theology has experienced massive transformations since the 16th century. This transformation has primarily been driven by anabaptist fervor in the last few centuries and by half-covenant Puritanism. But the Westminster Confession continues to speak with precision and fidelity. It asserts:

On Baptism: “…the grace promised is not only offered, but really exhibited, and conferred, by the Holy Ghost, to such (whether of age or infants) as that grace belongeth unto, according to the counsel of God’s own will, in his appointed time.”

Note the following on the language used:

First, this real exhibition is the consummative response to modern evangelical views on baptism. The Confession uses the word “really” to differentiate between “potentially” or “symbolically.” Baptism does something; we might even say that in baptism, the theater of God’s glory is revealed or exhibited for the world to see. The child or adult tastes of the real Christ in a real covenant with a real element.

Second, to “confer” the Confession means to bestow a new reality upon the baptized, to affirm in a baptismal investiture a new garment. As Paul articulates in Galatians, “For as many as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ.”

Third, the unique feature of our Reformed tradition is the objective reality and presence of the Holy Spirit. Some sacramental models speak of a radical mystical process, and others symbolize the entire endeavor, focusing on peculiar introspective concerns. But baptism is a deeply pneumatological event. The Spirit of God engages the person baptized not through the priest’s magic but by the means of water. The Reformed view does not accept sacerdotal implications.

Finally, there is an explicit assumption that infants, little children, and those who for some physical hindrance cannot reason are recipients of all these mercies. To remove these as recipients is foreign to the Scriptures. They are recipients of baptisms in the Old Testament through Moses and in the New Testament through the new lawgiver, Jesus. It’s for this reason that children are protagonists in the Gospels; they are central to Jesus’ mission. Through the witness of babes and infants, God moves the kingdom to its triumphal glory in the resurrection.

On September 4, 2023 By Uri Brito In Culture 1

Work as Eternal Stewardship

Labor Day has been a federal holiday in this country since 1894. Still, long ago, Solomon already opined on the importance of work: “A sluggard’s appetite is never filled, but the desires of the diligent are fully satisfied (Prov. 13:4).”

The Christian looks at Labor Day through the lens of the Apostle Paul’s view of work when he concluded his great tome on the resurrection in I Corinthians 15:

Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.

Paul believed that the fruit of the resurrection bears fruit in our labors. We labor in resurrection style, not as those without hope. We labor because our work has continued worth long after we are done.

Lester Dekoster defines work as that “which gives meaning to life because it is the form in which we make ourselves useful to others.” In our labors, we bring extended satisfaction to others and ourselves. If we did not work, we could never give back what rightly belongs to God in tithes and offerings. If we did not work, we could never support the vast missionary enterprise worldwide. If we did not labor, we could never enjoy the fruits of our labors in hospitality and charity.

Our work is a form of eternal stewardship. We labor on earth because it shows how we will labor for all eternity. We labor on earth because we are stewards of the earth and we will labor in heaven because all of creation will be ours.

We will never stop working! On this Labor Day, consider the meaning of your work. What you do is not in vain in this world or in the world to come.

On August 30, 2023 By Uri Brito In Church 1

Reformational Liturgy and Hospitality

We need to begin moving our liturgical efforts into the realm of hospitality. What I mean by this may appear obvious, but it is quite complicated on a large scale. Some congregations may want to move into that arena but are paralyzed by self-inflicted wounds. They are more interested in showing their distinctness than proving their distinctives through tangible actions.

We use a saying in our inquirer’s class that goes something like this: “We need to bathe our weirdness with a deep sense of commonness.” Internally and behind the scenes, we don’t view ourselves as weird, but we know that the perception exists in a thoroughly de-liturgized culture.

This came across in an observation from a mother who raised her daughter in a Reformed context and saw her daughter go into a different tradition altogether. Now, mind you, the daughter was not antagonistic towards Reformed Theology, but she found the practices of this broadly evangelical environment more friendly and inviting. For the record, I am the last person to give much credence to an impressionable young adult. Still, I do want to take the opportunity to offer some general thoughts on the art of commonness and why black coffee Calvinists like myself think our churches need more than mere liturgism.

The first observation is that our Reformational theology/liturgy should be inviting. However it is communicated–paraments or stripped tables–it must carry on the gravitas of joy from beginning to end.

We live in a culture that craves the normalcy of joy. If we invite younger generations to taste and see Geneva’s God, we must also ensure that we don’t portray Geneva as some ogre attempting to tyrannize conscience. Geneva needs to show up with smiles and greetings, not five points of inquiry.

The second note is that the sweetness of worship ought to give folks a sense of the holy. We need liturgical worship that brings people to see the sovereignty of God resting in every element of worship from beginning to end, in every line and every response.

Once, a visitor told one of our congregants that it was one of the most joyful experiences, even though much of what happened was foreign to him. But even if the impression is viscerally oppositional–and it has happened–we should still communicate a culture where the holy is a common ritual of the people. You cannot control reactions, but you can control interactions. You can control a sweet disposition towards a visitor. You can sit next to them when they walk in alone and guide them through the order of worship.

Third, and finally, if the liturgy is a living liturgy–contrary to modernistic ritualization experiences in mainline churches with alternating “Mother God” lines–then that liturgy must breathe life into the home. It needs to be perpetuated with food and drink for those strangers who visit. If they are not invited to see your lived-out liturgy, it is unlikely they will find pleasure in your acted-out liturgy on Sunday mornings. It will continue to be strange and foreign rather than warm and inviting.

Our liturgical efforts must move into hospitable efforts. In fact, I argue that liturgy necessarily moves into homes. Ultimately, we may still appear strange, and our songs may still give a Jane Austen vibe, but at the very least, we will have given visitors a sense of the holy and an invitation to joy. Our Reformed churches should contemplate that model in our day.

On August 21, 2023 By Uri Brito In Church 1

On Food and Congregational Meals

Our congregation holds a monthly fellowship meal. It’s spectacular in every culinary way. The other weeks, we host people in our homes, but it’s a fattening extravaganza on the last Sunday of the month! All sinners come home, and we kill the fatted calf with vigor and throw a party!

It’s also shaped by the kinds of things Robert Capon would savor were he present with us. Apart from the main dishes, there are delicacies made with gifted hands. Both have their place at the table. The desserts carry another special place serving as holy ambassadors. She brings rest to the weary and a boost of energy to the little covenanters running around.

It seems that food koinonias have lost their vigor in the scientific laboratory of the germaphobes of our culture. Long gone are the healthy gatherings of vivid recollections of stuffed-ness. We have allowed extraneous things to serve as an apologetic or an extra rationale to not eat as one should: with gusto.

One of the problems of modern evangelical “food theology” is that it has departed from its Hebrew history. We have chosen the mortification of the flesh over the enjoyment of life.

Paul was a strong critic of the “Do not taste! Do not touch!” attitudes of his contemporaries and indeed our own (Col. 2:21). We have forgotten that the Bible is an edible book, a book of lovely and superb meals beginning in the abundance of the Garden and ending in the Supper of the New World. But, in every portion of Scripture, you will find a tree that gives and gives and gives food to the hungry.

We ought to take every meal hostage in season and out of season. Every delicious bite is an act of praise and adoration, and when eaten in the company of fellow saints, it is a festive day; one with additional pleasure, for we were made to eat with one another.

When we partake together at the Lord’s Table on Sundays, the common table afterward becomes an extension of the holy. It is good and beneficial. It is sobering and enlightening. It is both delicious and life-altering.

When we eat together, we change ourselves into living sacrifices edible to the Triune God who swallows us into his glorious grace.

On August 14, 2023 By Uri Brito In Culture Like

Oliver Anthony and Rich Men North of Richmond: An Economic Manifesto

I’ve probably had 25 folks send me links to a song written by Oliver Anthony. His anthem has burst the Youtube charts, and he is now no. 1 on iTunes, even getting praise from the titan of podcasts, Joe Rogan.

He tells the story of singing to 20 people a few weeks ago and filling over 20 acres of cars after his song became a national sensation. He should sign something in the next few days or weeks. If you haven’t seen it, I’d encourage you to do it. It does contain some language, but the language can be justified. It’s an economic manifesto, or just a country-boy speaking his mind.

“Rich Man North of Richmond” tells the story of a man “selling my soul, workin’ all day” and “livin’ in the new world with an old soul.” I was struck by this use of language because it reflects a unique sense of contrast between two worlds. One world, led by rich men in D.C., act as members of the elite with little to no regard for the actual state of affairs among the populace. They tout their badges of honor and high-dollar dinners while the hard-working men work daily only to watch their dollar lose value and taxes increase “to no end.”

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On August 10, 2023 By Uri Brito In Scribblings Like

Why we need poets and practitioners

My latest substack addresses the need for poets and practitioners in the church:

“The pursuit of theology must be accessible to the people of God without using the complicated language of textbooks and lengthy systematic theologies—except when essential. Most of you will never read through John Calvin’s Institutes or John Frame’s 1219 pages of Systematic Theology unless you are predisposed to reading that type of literature.”

On July 3, 2023 By Uri Brito In Music Like

Why Church Music Must Endure

What’s the most popular Christian song sung in churches today? It’s called “Build My Life” from Bethel Music. The song was written in 2016 and has stood the test of a whopping seven years of longevity.

A new study on worship music “found that the lifespan of a hit worship song has declined dramatically in recent years.” There are reasons for this phenomenon. The research indicates that worship songs are made to “feed the algorithm.” In other words, they are intentionally written to supply a current need instead of embracing any sense of historical need. As one pastor observed:

“…the churn of worship music reflects the way Americans consume media in general, where ‘everything is immediate and has a short shelf life.'”

I suspect anyone reading my words for the last couple of years has a deep appreciation for my parody-like observations on such topics and is assured by my vivacious display of righteous anger toward the inevitable words above.

But I don’t want to simply use the above as some apologetic for despising Bethel or Hillsong. Hillsong, in particular, has undergone the agony of death a few thousand times these last few years. I don’t want to beat down a beaten foe, and I do leave room for common grace even music.

So, give me a couple of minutes to indoctrinate you just a bit. After all, it’s the only reason I have a Facebook account. It will be slow and painless. I promise. I will even tell a few stories. Then, I will be sure to close with some pertinent questions. So, stick around, kids!

Back in the 1990s–give or take a year or two before the rapture–I remember engaging a Christian radio program when I lived in Pennsylvania. The speaker had this remarkable voice filled with the sophistication of someone trained rhetorically under the best. He hailed from a town about an hour from where I was called Ligonier.

I kept tuning in every night, retiring early to ensure I was ready with a notebook before Robert Charles Sproul came on the scene heralded by “Sinfonia” from Handel’s Messiah. The whole thing was sublime, and coupled with Sproul’s elegance of delivery, it was theologically seductive, and I didn’t even know what “reformed” was at the time.

Part of my intrigue with Sproul was not only the gravitas of his delivery but the way he symphonically engaged the arts, theology, and culture–all three pieces ending with a major key of excellence. My wife and I spent some time attending his congregation in Sanford, and the sobering reality of the worship took my understanding of music to a whole new level.

I grew up thinking that music was preferential, a box of chocolate wherein you get what you get and hope for the best. If you want to feel young again and receive a double portion of the Spirit, then you visit your local mega-church with all the excellence of audio recording and a fine assembly of musicians to lead the way. And, in most cases, their voices can easily guide the whole song. It is like a monastery led by professional cantors. I do not minimize their work. It is well done unto the Lord.

In other cases, if you grew up with St. Fannie Crosby, then there is a pre-determined holy 25 classics that can be played repeatedly by your sweet pianist with all her flowery glory. When you sing those songs, you come to the garden alone and leave walking with Jesus. There is a certain addiction to those classics that is hard to erase in our evangelical culture.

I had the distinct privilege of being a part of both cultures, first as a singer in the congregation my father pastored in Brazil, which was a potpourri of highly emotional choruses with a blend of old hymns. Then, later in my Christian life, I had the joy of leading music at a Presbyterian Church using the RUF selection, which was hymns put into contemporary tunes.

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