Last weekend I attended the Washington Briefing: Values Voter Summit where I had the pleasure of hearing numerous engaging, civil, thought-provoking speeches by various pastors, pundits, and politicians.
Unfortunately, the only thing that made the news was the things that I didn't hear when I was there: Bishop Wellington Boone using the word "faggot"; Jerry Falwell implying that Hillary Clinton was more polarizing that Satan; Connie Marshner recommending using an unethical political tactic; and Ann Coulter sounding like...well, Ann Coulter.
Naturally, because I attended the event and because these are "my people" some folks consider me guilty by association. I wish I could say that they are wrong, that I can't be held accountable. But I can't. And I can. I'm just not sure what to do about it.
I can't apologize for another person's actions. I don't personally know any of these people and it would be the height of presumption for me to offer a mea culpa on their behalf. I could lodge my complaint to them in private, but that doesnt address the concerns of the public. I could openly denounce and censure them (and admittedly have in the case of Coulter) but they are still my fellow Christians. As much as I condemn their remarks, they are, like me, members of the body of Christ.
I could simple remain silent, ignore the issue and wait till the controversy passes. I must confess that this was my original plan. Even now I'm tempted to hit the delete button before this entry is posted. But that would be cowardly. For better or worse, this is a matter that I must address.
This is the point in the post where I should offer an explanation of how I plan to resolve the conflict. I should present a clever resolution, possibly one that can"t even be explained in English but must rely on a foreign term, like schadenfreude or katahara itai. It would get me off the hook and leave everyone admiring my wit and insight.
But to be honest...I got nothing.
So here's a story that's somewhat related: In 1924, the first editor of Kiwanis Magazine, Roe Fulkerson, published a column carrying the title "He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother". In the article Fulkerson's encounters "a spindly and physically weak lad" carrying a baby and "staggering towards a neighboring park". "Pretty big load for such a small kid", said Fulkerson. "Why, mister," the boy smiled, "He ain't heavy; he's my brother."
I wish I could say that. The truth is, though, my brothers are heavy.
I don"t enjoy carrying the burden of being associated with them when they speak in ways that are hurtful and un-Christian. I also don't like the feeling of guilt that comes from knowing that I also say things that are hurtful and un-Christian and that shame my fellow believers. So maybe the most I can say is yes, they are heavy. But they're still my brothers (and sisters) in Christ. I may not like everything they say or do, but I love them just the same.
[Disclaimer: While it should go without saying, my views do not necessarily reflect those of my employer. I'm speaking only for myself and not for the organization that I serve with pride and pleasure. I don't always agree with the positions of FRC and I can guarantee that they certainly don't necessarily agree with many of the opinions I express on this blog. Do not take anything that I say to reflect the opinions of that organization. I am speaking only for myself.]
Over the years people have asked me why, since this is an evangelical blog, I don’t mention Jesus more often. My usual glib answer is that I prefer not to name-drop just because I'm on a first name basis with the Creator of the Universe. I also take offense at the implication my sole mission as an evangelical blogger is to end every post with an altar call.
While it’s true that I don’t casually use the name of Jesus, I believe that, like Flannery O’Connor’s South, this blog is “Christ-haunted.” Still, there is a time to talk about Jesus more directly. Since I think about him constantly, I often have questions, concerns, surprises, opinions, and—on rarer occasions—insights, about Christ. Here, for instance, are a few thoughts I’ve had this week:
Christians believe, as the Nicene Creed states, that Jesus was both “true God” and “truly human.” We consider it axiomatic that Jesus is the only human that can claim to be the “true God.” But I think it could also be argued that Jesus is the only human that can claim to know what it is to be “truly human.”
It has been said that theology became anthropology when God became man. But I think we fail to appreciate what a significant insight into anthropology was given to us by the incarnation. Not only did Jesus provide us an image of God, he provided us with an image of the pre-Fall man (and, amazingly, did so in a post-Fall context). While it may be difficult to determine what aspects are attributable to his humanity or to his divinity, he gives us a clear vision of what being a human should look like. He gives us a view of what was meant to be and what those who put their trust in him will become in the future.
“Jesus is not a Republican or a Democrat,” said John Mark Reynolds, “He’s probably a monarchist.” When I first heard that at GodBlogCon I thought it was clever; now I find it to be a profound insight. Jesus constantly talked about the Kingdom of Heaven. So why do so few Christians talk about it? One reason, I believe, is that we are now all republicans and democrats (small-R, small-D) and simply don’t understand what Jesus is talking about. We may use the term “Lord” and “King of Kings” but—unlike the vast majority of people throughout history--we do not comprehend what it means to live under the reign of a king. We need some remedial training on how to live as subjects in a kingdom. We may be justified in rejecting the divine right of kings to rule but we cannot be justified if we reject the rule of our divine king.
Whenever I hear non-Christians say that they don’t like the “Old Testament God” but that they admire Jesus I always wonder, “Have they ever read the Gospels?” Even if you set aside the “Lord, Liar, Lunatic” trilemma you’re still left with the fact that Jesus considered everything he did to be consonant with his “Father” (i.e., OTG). His every action, as he claims, was done in submission to God’s will.
Sure, he healed people and hung out with sinners. But he also called them to repentance. As the old cliché goes, Jesus loved the sinner but hated the sin. In fact, Jesus hates sin more than [Fill in the name of an intolerant Fundamentalist preacher]. And you think OTG was a blood-thirsty war-monger? Jesus goes even further promising not only to pit nations but families against each other. “Do not think that I have come to bring peace on earth,” says Jesus. “I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.” In other words, he ain’t no Jewish Ghandi. If you don’t like Yahweh, then you shouldn’t be too fond of Yeshua either.
In 1896 a Christian socialist named Charles Sheldon wrote a book called In His Steps which popularized the slogan “What Would Jesus Do” and inspired two of the most well-intentioned but misguided fads of the 20th century: the Social Gospel movement and the marketing of WWJD paraphernalia. The problem with both is that they are based on WWJD and that is the wrong question.
The Gospels provide us with a rather clear record of what Jesus did -- healed the sick, preached, traveled, made disciples, etc. While we may also be expected to do these types of things, they were essential to Christ’s earthly mission. If he were walking the streets of America he would likely still be doing the same thing. But is this what we should be doing? Not necessarily. We are not Jesus; we are his disciples. Our mission is not his mission but the mission he assigns us. The question we should keep constantly before us is “What Would Jesus Want Me To Do.” But then WWJWMTD isn’t as easy to embroider on a bracelet or fit on a bumper sticker.
Some people assume that Jesus was a carpenter while others (on better evidence I believe) think he was a rabbi. Whether he worked with wood or with words, I think it is indisputable that Jesus was a philosopher. As philosopher Dallas Willard wrote in his essay, “Jesus the Logician”:
There is in our culture an uneasy relation between Jesus and intelligence, and I have actually heard Christians respond to my statement that Jesus is the most intelligent man who ever lived by saying that it is an oxymoron. Today we automatically position him away from (or even in opposition to) the intellect and intellectual life. Almost no one would consider him to be a thinker, addressing the same issues as, say, Aristotle, Kant, Heidegger or Wittgenstein, and with the same logical method.
It truly is then, as Mark Noll once wrote, a “scandal” that evangelicals have failed so miserably in their commanded task of “putting on the mind of Christ.” As a group we should be fertile ground for producing intellectuals. After all, we are disciples of the greatest thinker in history.
One of the most poignant and profound theological lessons about Jesus remains the one I first learned as a four-year-old:
Jesus loves me
This I know
For the Bible tells me so
I could strive for centuries and not be able to produce an insight so beautiful, concise, and true.
First, my bona fides.
I’m a former Gunnery Sergeant in the Marine Corps. I’ve spent fifteen years in the Corps and fifteen seconds (cumulatively) riding bulls. I’ve spent my summers in 100 degree weather baling hay, shoeing horses, castrating hogs, and running laps for sadistic football coaches. I’ve fixed pump jacks in Texas oil fields and made auto parts in a Missouri factory. I’ve changed engines on F-18s, tires on Humvees, and a carburetor on a '76 Gremlin.
I’ve hunted snipe and fished for shark. I’ve eaten rattlesnake, alligator, and the pork pattie from an MRE. I’ve lived through tornados, typhoons, and a divorce.
I own a .40 caliber Glock. My hero is John Wayne.
In other words, there is some evidence that I am—or at least once was—a fairly “manly man.” I’m also a devout Bible-believing Christian. But for the life of me, I can’t discern how the two are connected, much less why one is necessary for the other. Yet that is the impression I often get when I read about the “feminization of the church” and the move to provide young Christian men with “masculine” role models.
At the risk of taking his light-hearted remarks too seriously, I have to say that I find pastor Mark Driscoll, founder of Mars Hill Church in Seattle, to be particularly caught up in this type of thinking. For example, in a recent post he gave a “Manly Missionary Award (MMA)” to Dog the Bounty Hunter:
Jesus was a carpenter who walked a lot of miles and was therefore a fit, blue-collar type of guy who would never drive a Cabriolet, rock out to Mariah Carey, or wear lemon-yellow. Fortunately, as Dog becomes more popular among non-Christians who watch his television show, a more biblical view of Christian masculinity is getting out, for which I say, “WWJD – We Welcome Jesus’ Dog.”
I agree that Dog does seems to be a dedicated (though perhaps immature) believer and is worthy of commendation. But I fail to see how he presents a “biblical view of Christian masculinity.”
In fact, the type of men that Driscoll seems to admire most – wrestlers, “ultimate fighters” – are the very antithesis of Biblical masculinity. During the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus praised the “meek” a word that in the Greek is used in reference to a “tame” wild animal. The lion, for instance, is able to lay down with the lamb precisely because he is not given over to his hyper-aggressive nature.
Indeed, when Jesus talks about his followers he often refers to them as “sheep” – creatures that aren’t known for their ferocity. And when he gave the nickname “Sons of Thunder” to two of his disciplies, it wasn’t exactly high praise for their obnoxious brand of masculinity. It is difficult to square the Jesus of the Gospels with the hyper-masculine ideal that Driscoll and many others seem to hold. It takes an incredible leap of logic to conclude that since Jesus was a carpenter he would have enjoyed 'Rassling.*
(Perhaps a case could be made that the church has become overly feminized, causing young men to turn away. The criticisms, for example, of “Jesus is my boyfriend” style worships songs may have some merit. But then what do such critics think of Christ referring to the church as his “Bride”?)
During the early ‘90s, “wildman” retreats were all the rage as a way for men to get in touch with their mannishness. Men would head to the wilderness take off their shirts, beat on West African drums, and bond with each other. While we may laugh at such goofy behavior, this neo-testosterone movement within Christian circles isn’t all that different. We’ve simply replaced the mythopoetic “Iron John” with a mythic “Iron Jesus.” But young men don’t need a Jesus who strolls like the Duke, squints like Eastwood, and snarls like Rumsfeld. They don't need Jesus the wrestler or Jesus the warrior. They just need Jesus the Savior.
*In a culture that assumes close male relationships are evidence of repressed homosexuality, it’s not surprising that so many Christian men are infatuated by displays of simulated male violence. In ancient Israel David and Jonathan were able to express their love for each other without anyone assuming they were “gay.” Today, give a guy a hug and you’re considered to be “acting queer.” Don spandex and wrap your arms around another male, though, and they’ll call it “wrestling” -- and think it's completely hetero behavior.
[Note: Sorry for the blogging delay but I'm still in the process of getting unpacked. This post originally appeared in April 2005. New posts will resume on Wednesday.]
In his essay on “The Pleasures of Eating”, the philosopher and farmer Wendell Berry says that after delivering a lecture on the decline of American farming and rural life, someone in the audience would invariably ask what city people can do. “Eat responsibly," Berry would reply.
…by restoring one's consciousness of what is involved in eating; by reclaiming responsibility for one's own part in the food economy. One might begin with the illuminating principle of Sir Albert Howard's The Soil and Health, that we should understand "the whole problem of health in soil, plant, animal, and man as one great subject." Eaters, that is, must understand that eating takes place inescapably in the world, that it is inescapably an agricultural act, and that how we eat determines, to a considerable extent, how the world is used. This is a simple way of describing a relationship that is inexpressibly complex. To eat responsibly is to understand and enact, so far as one can, this complex relationship.
Berry argues that eating is an agrarian act and that something valuable is lost when we subscribe to the industrialized, consumerist view of sustenance. Although his essay is about food, his words could be applied to another method of fulfilling a physical need -- sex. In fact, he draws a similar parallel in his discussion of “industrial sex”:
It is odd that simply because of its ‘sexual freedom’ our time should be considered extraordinarily physical. In fact, our ‘sexual revolution’ is mostly an industrial phenomenon, in which the body is used as a idea of pleasure or a pleasure machine with the aim of ‘freeing’ natural pleasure from natural consequence.
Like any other industrial enterprise, industrial sexuality seeks to conquer nature by exploiting it and ignoring the consequences, by denying any connection between nature and spirit or body and soul, and by evading social responsibility. The spiritual, physical, and economic costs of this ‘freedom’ are immense, and are characteristically belittled or ignored. The diseases of sexual irresponsibility are regarded as a technological problem and an affront to liberty.
Industrial sex, characteristically, establishes its freeness and goodness by an industrial accounting, dutifully toting up numbers of ‘sexual partners,’ orgasms, and so on, with the inevitable industrial implication that the body is somehow a limit on the idea of sex, which will be a great deal more abundant as soon as it can be done by robots.
Berry offers advice on how to recover the pleasures of eating from consumerism. In imitation, I offer the following modest suggestions for how Christians* can recover sex from industrialization:
1. We should continuously point out that the term pre-marital sex is an oxymoron. Because sex and marriage both perform the function of uniting a man and a woman into one-flesh, engaging in sexual relations is ontologically indistinguishable from marriage. Even when the tongue claims otherwise, the body understands the promise being made during intercourse. Saying “I do” with the body may not carry the same consequences as it does in a marriage ceremony, but the effects on the soul are similar.
2. Some people will claim that there is something valuable to be gained by having multiple sexual partners before settling down for lifelong monogamy. These misguided souls completely miss the point. Sex is not a technique to be mastered but a means of communicating. Sexual intercourse is a non-verbal expression of profound commitment, openness, and trust. Having multiple sexual “partners” as a means of preparing for marriage is like mastering the art of lying in order to become a paragon of honesty.
3. The bookstores are filled with books and magazines that offer tips and advice on maximizing pleasure, providing multiple orgasms, and other ways to have “better” sex. This desire to improve and be more productive is a hallmark of industrialized sex. But there is no objective standard by which sex can be measured against. “Good” sex is not found by following a formula which will lead to the efficient maximization of sexual pleasure. Sex cannot be measured by the number of orgasms per hour (OPH) or any other idealized unit of measure anymore than a good conversation can be measured by the number of words spoken.
4. How long should lovemaking sessions last? Ideally, from the beginning to the end. Truly, the focus on time (“I can make love all night…”) is absurd. Clocks and calendars have no place in sexual relations. Intimacy is a lifelong process that begins on the wedding day and is unjustly interrupted by death; intercourse is simply intense periods of special physical intimacy that ebb and flow throughout this period. While each phase is special and important the duration is of minor consequence. Watching the clock takes the focus off the proper object: one’s spouse.
5. Although sex is not tied to the Gregorian calendar, it is cyclical, often following the natural rhythms of the female body. The husband’s desire should, therefore, be respectful of the woman’s physical and hormonal cycles. Her body is the means by which God chose to bring forth new life and the vessel he chose to enter the world in physical form. A woman’s body is not a machine for delivering pleasure but a mysterious and precious creation. Husbands should always keep that in mind.
6. Having sex can lead to having children. Industrialized sex views this as a potentially unfortunate hazard that should be avoided. Deciding to have a child is a decision that should be made prayerfully and with God’s guidance. And the choice of using technology – whether a thermometer or the Pill – to avoid an untimely pregnancy is a matter between a couple and their Creator. But sex should never be completely stripped of its conceptive role.
7. Sex may be a joy and a sanctuary but it is also a marital duty. It is the primary physical method God provides in order to deepen and strengthen the union of a man and a woman. Forgoing sex for long periods of time can be a form of disobedience. If we are physically able, we should give ourselves to our spouses. We are the sole means by which they are able to properly meet that physical need. Denying our spouse food or sleep would be cruel and unjust. Withholding sex is no different.
8. While it hardly needs to be said, p*rnography has no place in marriage. Sex is intended to be viewed from the place of a first-person participant, not a third-person observer. One of the reasons pornography becomes addictive is because it leads to the attempt to fulfill an impossible desire. When observing p*rn, a person shifts from an I-Thou relationship to the place of the Other, forever outside, waiting to be invited in. That invitation never comes, leading to an endlessly frustrating search for fulfillment that can never be met.
9. Equipment belongs in the factory, not in the bedroom. If you need battery-operated tools to enhance your sexual experience you have a problem.
10. Most of what gets classified under the category of sex has nothing to do with sex at all. Fetishes, sadomasochism, dominance and submission, etc., are always about something else (usually power) and never about intimacy and communication. Sort out your psychological issues on your counselor’s couch, not in your marriage bed.
11. A last bit of advice for young people: You may foolishly decide that you need to “make your own mistakes” rather than rely on the hard-earned experience of those that have gone before you. You may even be able to avoid most of the more blatantly detrimental aspects of sexual sin. I certainly did. I never suffered from the ravages of a venereal disease or had to deal with the effects of an unexpected pregnancy. I never suffered much of anything from my sin – except for loss. I lost one of the most valuable gifts God gives man: the ability to give myself completely to the person I love.
Anyone who tells you that sex outside of marriage causes no harm is a liar and a fool. You can’t build a fire in your lap and not get burned. And you can’t have multiple sexual partners and not become desensitized to the beauty and intimacy of marital intercourse. With Christ there is redemption and the hope of restoration. But before you make a rash choice, weigh the cost. It is never worth the price of true intimacy.
12. Christian couples are not only joined in union with each other but are united within the body of Christ. We belong not to ourselves but to each other. The church, therefore, must take an interest in the sexual needs of couples just as it would in the other spiritual and physical needs. The community of believers needs to show that the Bride of Christ rejects industrialized sex.
*I address this post to Christians because non-believers would not share my understanding of the role and nature of sex. While there may be some overlap of agreement, the presuppositional attitude of most non-Christians would be so foreign to my view (that God created sexual relations with a specific form and for a particular range of purposes) it would be impossible to offer suggestions for a general audience.
On the list of claims that are bound to get you into trouble, “Don't marry a woman with a career” ranks near the top. Yet Forbes.com editor Michael Noer recently offered just such a warning to men:
Why? Because if many social scientists are to be believed, you run a higher risk of having a rocky marriage. While everyone knows that marriage can be stressful, recent studies have found professional women are more likely to get divorced, more likely to cheat, less likely to have children, and, if they do have kids, they are more likely to be unhappy about it.
[…]
If a host of studies are to be believed, marrying these women is asking for trouble. If they quit their jobs and stay home with the kids, they will be unhappy (Journal of Marriage and Family, 2003). They will be unhappy if they make more money than you do (Social Forces, 2006). You will be unhappy if they make more money than you do (Journal of Marriage and Family, 2001). You will be more likely to fall ill (American Journal of Sociology). Even your house will be dirtier (Institute for Social Research).
Noer points out that this findings are based on studies from the social sciences and even adds qualifying clauses (“if many social scientists are to be believed,…”; “If a host of studies are to be believed…”; “…it's important not to confuse correlation with causation…”) to distance himself from the conclusions. Such hedging wasn’t enough, though, for he has been savaged in the blogosphere for making the politically incorrect claim that there might be reasons a man would not want to choose a career woman for a potential wife. But if statistics show that you are more likely to be divorced if you marry a career woman then a man who avoids marrying a career woman is less likely—statistically speaking and all other things being equal—to get divorced.
Such a cold statistical inference, though, cannot determine whether the connection is a matter of correlation or causation. Personally, I think it has less to do with a woman having a professional career than with either (a) the type of women who choose such career paths and/or (b) the experiences that are obtained while seeking such paths.
Consider, for example, a woman who has completed a BA and an MBA from Ivy League schools and has taken a job at a Fortune 500 company. Statistically speaking, such a woman will be less likely to have a traditional view of religion or sexual mores; will have had several sexual partners; and will seek marriage primarily for emotional fulfillment. These factors, not the fact that she is an executive, will detrimentally affect her chances of being “happily and fruitfully married.”
This is not to say that marital bliss requires women to become June Cleaver-style stay-at-home moms. In fact, the biblical ideal for a wife, which is clearly presented in Proverbs 31:10-31, shares much in common with what we would nowadays consider a “career woman.” The primary difference is that becoming a “professional woman” entails acquiring qualities to build an impressive resume, while becoming a “Proverbs 31 woman” requires obtaining qualities to build an impressive character. But just as Noer warns against marrying a career woman, many Christians would advise (in reality if not in theory) that you avoid marrying a “Proverbs 31 woman.”
The last chapter of Proverbs describes and praises the “noble wife” and outlines the traits that make her a role model. The woman described is characterized primarily by her actions. Within the 21 verses a number of action verbs are used in describing what she does: arises (gets up), brings, considers, extends, holds, grasps, makes, opens, (over)sees, trades, plants, provides, portions, selects, supplies, speaks, and works.
Each of these 21 verses also describes a particular virtue or quality that the “noble wife” possesses. The Proverbs 31 woman is charitable, entrepreneurial, fashionable, financially astute, healthy, industrious, loving, managerial, productive, prudent, resourceful, responsible, reverent, self-confident, skilled, trustworthy, virtuous, wise, praiseworthy as a wife and mother, and married to a respectable husband.
According to Proverbs, the ideal wife is:
A woman who is…virtuous
10 A wife of noble character who can find? She is worth far more than rubies.
A woman who is…trustworthy
11 Her husband has full confidence in her and lacks nothing of value.
A woman who is…loving
12 She brings him good, not harm, all the days of her life.
A woman who is…industrious
13 She selects wool and flax and works with eager hands.
A woman who is…resourceful
14 She is like the merchant ships, bringing her food from afar.
A woman who is…responsible
15 She gets up while it is still dark; she provides food for her family and portions for her servant girls.
A woman who is…entrepreneurial
16 She considers a field and buys it; out of her earnings she plants a vineyard.
A woman who is…healthy
17 She sets about her work vigorously; her arms are strong for her tasks.
A woman who is…financially astute
18 She sees that her trading is profitable, and her lamp does not go out at night.
A woman who is…skilled
19 In her hand she holds the distaff and grasps the spindle with her fingers.
A woman who is…charitable
20 She opens her arms to the poor and extends her hands to the needy.
A woman who is…prudent
21 When it snows, she has no fear for her household; for all of them are clothed in scarlet.
A woman who is…fashionable
22 She makes coverings for her bed; she is clothed in fine linen and purple.
A woman who is…married to a respectable husband
23 Her husband is respected at the city gate, where he takes his seat among the elders of the land.
A woman who is…productive
24 She makes linen garments and sells them, and supplies the merchants with sashes.
A woman who is…self-confident
25 She is clothed with strength and dignity; she can laugh at the days to come.
A woman who is…wise
26 She speaks with wisdom, and faithful instruction is on her tongue.
A woman who is…managerial
27 She watches over the affairs of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness.
A woman who is…praiseworthy as a wife and mother
28-29 Her children arise and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her: "Many women do noble things, but you surpass them all."
A woman who is…reverent
30-31 Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised. Give her the reward she has earned, and let her works bring her praise at the city gate.
Sadly, even among evangelical Christians this ideal has fallen out of favor. Although we often give lip service about how we admire this passage, we reject its implied list of virtues in favor of our own brand of “family values.”
For example, the passage says nothing at all about the wife being directly responsible for educating the children. But how many Christian women today think being a “homeschool mom” is more virtuous than running a business from home? Or what about the passage where the woman “considers a field and buys it”? Can you imagine the reaction from her Bible-believing, complementarian husband if she were to purchase land without consulting him first? We praise the ideal but what we really mean is “Don’t marry a Proverbs 31 woman.”
This is not to imply that I’m against homeschooling (I’m definitely not) or that I wouldn’t freak out if my wife bought a couple of acres without consulting me (I definitely would). But we need to carefully consider how the qualities and virtues presented in Proverbs 31 can be translated into our own time and culture. As Christians we need to present a more robust view of the role of the “noble wife” that is rooted more in the Bible than in 50’s-era faux nostalgia.
In a famous review in a 1950 issue of the journal Mind, Sir Peter Medawar said of a book by Teilhard de Chardin, “its author can be excused of dishonesty only on the grounds that before deceiving others he has taken great pains to deceive himself.” Something similar could be said of Randall Balmer’s recent essay, “Jesus Is Not a Republican.” If Palmer is not being intentionally misleading and dishonest, it is only because he has first misled and deceived himself.
Self-deception is no crime, but Balmer a professor of American Religion at Barnard College, Columbia University, has an incredible potential to mislead. Balmer is a respected academic who has taught as a visiting professor at Yale, Princeton, Rutgers, Drew and Northwestern universities, Union Theological Seminar, and the Graduate School of Journalism at Columbia. He has also served as an editor-at-large for Christianity Today magazine and is widely sought as a commentator by Time, Newsweek, CNN, ABC, CBS, Fox News, PBS and the BBC. His views on evangelicalism are taken seriously by both the mainstream media and the academic community. He may not have the name recognition of Tony Campolo or Jim Wallis but he is a leading voice for liberal evangelicalism.
The essay, an excerpt from his recent book, Thy Kingdom Come: How the Religious Right Distorts the Faith and Threatens America: An Evangelical's Lament, attempts to preempt the inevitable criticism’s of his views: “I know, for example, that when my new book on evangelicals appears, the minions of the religious right will seek to discredit me rather than engage the substance of my arguments.” Fortunately, we don’t have to choose for he gives us plenty of reason to criticize both him and his rather substance-free arguments.
Let’s begin first with the personal. Balmer predicates his criticism of evangelicals by purporting to be an evangelical himself. “I'll put up my credentials as an evangelical against anyone's!” he exclaims. The extent of his credentials, though, appears to be his claim to being an evangelical. He attends a decidedly non-evangelical Episcopalian church in one of the most mainline dioceses in America. And ever since his 1989 book, Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory: Travels Through the Evangelical Subculture, he’s attempted to distance himself both theologically and culturally from anything that could be discerned as being distinctively evangelical.
Not only is there no orthodoxy behind his evangelicalism, there is little rigor behind his arguments. For example, Balmer recently told NPR that “blind allegiance to the Republican Party has distorted the faith of politically active evangelicals, leading them to misguided positions on issues such as abortion and homosexuality.” His claim might have been more coherent if he had said that allegiance to politically active evangelicals has caused the Republican Party to take misguided positions on issues such as abortion and homosexuality. That would have at least made more sense than the inane claim that evangelicals oppose abortion and homosexuality only because we are under the spell of our GOP overlords.
So what is his “evangelical” view on abortion, “a matter properly left to a woman and her conscience”?
I have no interest in making abortion illegal; I would like to make it unthinkable. The most effective way to limit the incidence of abortion is to change the moral climate surrounding the issue — through education or even through public-service campaigns similar to those that discourage smoking or drugs or alcohol or spousal abuse.
Such statements are typical of the sloppy thinking and soft-on-abortion rhetoric of liberal evangelicals. Even the most ardent pro-choice advocate would admit that making the procedure illegal would effectively limit the incidence of abortion. Yet Balmer appears to be unaware that spousal abuse and narcotics are both illegal. He also fails to recognize that smoking and drinking alcohol are often more restricted than abortion.
If his criticism seems peculiar, consider how it might have been applied in the 1850s, when evangelicals were opposing slavery:
I have no interest in making slavery illegal; I would like to make it unthinkable. The most effective way to limit the incidence of slavery is to change the moral climate surrounding the issue — through education or even through public-service campaigns similar to those that discourage smoking or drugs or alcohol or spousal abuse.
You might assume that since he wants to make abortion “unthinkable” he would reserve his harshest criticisms for the political party that wants to preserve abortion-on-demand as an unquestionable constitutional right. But Balmer doesn’t have a negative word to spare for the Democratic Party. In fact, to ensure that we don’t misunderstand his point, he clarifies which side of the political divide God prefers:
"Do not be misled," St. Paul wrote to the Corinthians. "Bad company corrupts good character." Jesus himself asked: "What good would it be for you to gain the whole world, yet forfeit your soul?" The coalition with the Republican Party is blasphemy, pure and simple.
The charge of blasphemy seems a bit excessive. For instance, during the last GOP convention the evangelical delegates excused themselves when the crowd began sacrificing virgins to Alan Greenspan. Conservative evangelicals do, after all, have limits. Still, its seems rather peculiar to hear such a charge come from a man who has the temerity to claim “the leaders of the religious right are vicious toward anyone who refuses to kowtow to their version of orthodoxy,…"
While it is difficult to ascertain his motives, I suspect that Balmer desperately crave the approval of true (read: secular) liberals. He knows that like former Communist Party apparatchiks, the fastest way to ingratiate himself is to confirm their conspiracy-drenched fears:
A number of people have asked me what the religious right wants. What would America look like if the religious right had its way? I've thought long and hard about that question, and the best answer I can come up with is that the religious right hankers for the kind of homogeneous theocracy that the Puritans tried to establish in 17th-century Massachusetts: to impose their vision of a moral order on all of society.
Such a claim is a prime example of Carter’s Law of Political Rhetoric, which states that “as the number of religious conservatives expressing an opinion on a moral or political issue increases, the probability that someone on the political left will invoke the term “theocracy” approaches one.” History will eventually prove this to be the most empirically verifiable maxim in political science. There is also overwhelming evidence to conclude that anyone who claims that American evangelicals want to establish a theocracy is either irredeemably stupid or pathologically dishonest. In Balmer’s case I believe that it is clear that he is intentionally dishonest. He simply includes too many lies, half-truth, and relevant omissions to draw any other conclusion.
For instance, he repeatedly makes claims implying that religious faith should not influence politics. “The lesson was clear. Religion functions best outside the political order, and often as a challenge to the political order.…religion in America has always functioned best from the margins, outside of the circles of power, and that any grasping for religious hegemony ultimately trivializes and diminishes the faith…”
If he truly believes this then why in his essay in The Nation did he encourage John Kerry to attend an evangelical church "from time to time." What would be the purpose of mixing church and politics in that way? And why does he not mention that he himself ran for State Representative in Connecticut? Does he assume (rightly) that we might be more skeptical of such claims coming from a Democratic Party hack than we would a purportedly objective professor of religion?
In fact, this is the greatest weakness of Balmer’s entire essay, a problem that plagues the political left-wing of evangelicalism. He wants to argue that conservative Christians should stay out of politics because religious informed political positions have no place in a pluralistic society. His main premise is that since conservative evangelicals (at least their “leaders”) are all theocrats that they must stay out of politics altogether. But the implication is that it is acceptable for liberal evangelicals like him—who would never allow their religious beliefs to interfere with their party’s platform—to run for office since they vote for morally superior Democrats and not the “blasphemous” Republicans.
This attitude is the primary reason that politically liberal evangelicals are consistently marginalized and ineffective. Since they know their positions can rarely be supported by scripture, evidence, or reality, they appeal to a “social gospel” that is built around a Jesus who supports abortion rights and same-sex marriage and opposes “creationism” and Wal-Mart. Balmer’s view is representative of a variety of liberal evangelical whose perception of Jesus is shaped more by repeated viewings of Jesus Christ Superstar than by reading the Gospels.
About the only thing I can find to agree with in Balmer’s article is the title. I whole-heartedly agree that Jesus is not a Republican, nor for that matter, is Jesus a Democrat. As Biola professor John Mark Reynolds notes, “He’s probably a monarchist.”
Addendum: Accusing someone of being dishonest is not something I take lightly so I want to present one more example that I believe is typical of Balmer’s approach. In the second paragraph he ends with the sentence: “Another evangelical friend with political convictions similar to mine actually endured a heresy trial.”
You might be led to believe that it was the liberal political convictions of his “evangelical friend’ that led to the heresy trial. But this is not the case. He is referring, of course, to Tony Campolo, a man who holds the distinction of being the only living prominent evangelical leader to undergo a heresy trial. What instigated the trial was Campolo’s belief that Christ is present in every person, Christian or not. "I do not mean that others represent Jesus for us," he wrote in A Reasonable Faith, a 1983 book aimed at secularists. "I mean that Jesus actually is present in each other person."
They were also upset with two other sentences in the book: "Jesus is the only Savior, but not everybody who is saved by Him is aware that He is the one who is doing the saving," and "Jesus is God because he is fully human." ("By human I mean a full expression of the image of God," he later explained.) The pastors accused him of "semantic mysticism" and "spiritual adultery," while Campolo said he was a victim of "a wave of religious McCarthyism."
To resolve the debate, the Christian Legal Society called a four-member "reconciliation panel" together, and questioned the sociologist-evangelist for six hours. A week later, the panel, headed by theologian J. I. Packer, issued a statement calling Campolo's book "methodologically naïve and verbally incautious."
Growing up in the church—especially a Southern Baptist church—can delude a person into thinking they are biblically literate. I grew up in the church and became convinced that the countless Sunday School lessons had taught me almost everything I needed to know about the Bible. I could recount, as told through the medium of flannelgraph, all the stories of Samson, Noah, David, and the other Great Heroes of the Old Testament. I also knew the story of Jesus and could tell you all about St. Paul, at least up to the part about the shipwreck and snakebite. After that the action slowed down and I lost interest in the narrative. But I figured since most of the stuff in the back of the book was mostly letters it couldn’t be that important anyway.
It wasn’t until I reached adulthood that I realized my knowledge of the Book of Revelation was based more on The Omen (the original, nor the remake) and Hal Lindsey’s books than on the actual text. I was quite surprised to discover that the words “antichrist” and “rapture” are not found in that book and that it was spelled "Revelation" (singular) rather than "Revelations" (plural).
Such misperceptions, however, are not uncommon. Even those who are more biblically literate than I will ever be sometimes make such mistakes. My friend Tim Challies, for instance, provides a regrettable example of such an error. In a recent post, Tim defends a quote by Robert Murray M'Cheyne that claims the Roman Catholic Church is the “Beast of Revelation”:
M'Cheyne is by no means unique in suggesting that the beast is none other than the Roman Catholic Church. One could easily argue that this is nothing more than the consensus of historic Protestantism.
When I was a member of the First Church of Hellfire and Brimstone, I do recall hearing similar claims. (1) But to call this view the “consensus of historic Protestantism” is a rather bold assertion that must be backed up by a strong argument. Unfortunately, Tim does not provide the required justification:
I'd like to take a look at what some great Protestants of days past have had to say about the beast of Revelation. As you read, remember that we tend to misrepresent the meaning of the prefix "anti-" in the word "antichrist." We most often think of the prefix "anti-" as meaning "against," but in context of antichrist it actually means "in place of." So these men were not looking for someone or something that sought to fight explicitly against Christ (such as the Muslim faith) but something or someone that sought to set itself up in place of Christ.
Tim’s clarification that “anti” means “in place of” rather than “against” is helpful, though I personally believe that the prefix may be validly used in both senses. Unfortunately, he follows up this insight with a form of argument that is terribly muddled. Tim's primary premise could be outlined as:
The Beast of Revelation (a) is an Antichrist (b)
The papacy (c) is an antichrist (b)
The Beast of (a) Revelation is the papacy (c)
This would be an invalid form, akin to saying:
Joe (a) is a mammal (b)
A monkey (c) is a mammal (b)
Joe (a) is a monkey (c)
For Tim’s form to be logically valid he would have to say:
All antichrists are the Beast of Revelation. (P --> Q) The papacy is an antichrist. (P)
Therefore, the papacy is the Beast of Revelation. (Q)
Although this is a valid argument, the premise is unbiblical (and, I would claim, unsound). While it can be inferred that the Beast of Revelation belongs in the category of antichrists, the Bible is clear that not all antichrists are the Beast of Revelation (See: 1 John 2:18, 22; 4:3; and 2 John 1:7)
Tim goes on to quote Martin Luther, John Calvin, John Knox, Thomas Cranmer, Roger Williams, Cotton Mather, John Wesley, Charles Spurgeon, and the Westminster Confession of Faith claiming that either the Catholic Church or the papacy is the antichrist. What none of them claim--at least not in these quotes—is that the papacy is the Beast of Revelation. This invalidates his primary support since these two terms are neither synonymous nor interchangeable.
While it is possible that all of these great thinkers could have committed a logical fallacy by intending to say what Tim claims, I think it is more reasonable and generous to assume (and I hope that Tim would agree) that my friend is the one in error.
There is, however, another reason that I think this argument is faulty. I believe it is unwarranted to associate the Beast of Revelation with an institution, whether individual (i.e., the papacy) or collective (e.g., the Catholic Church). The key text is Revelation 19:20:
But the beast was captured, and with him the false prophet who had performed the miraculous signs on his behalf. With these signs he had deluded those who had received the mark of the beast and worshiped his image. The two of them were thrown alive into the fiery lake of burning sulfur.
Can an institution or collective be “thrown alive into the fiery lake?” To be honest, I don’t know enough about apocalyptic imagery to know if institutions can be treated as if they were individuals. My guess, based on the perspicuity of scripture, is that it cannot. (2) Still, I’d be open to hearing hermeneutical arguments to the contrary.
Near his concluding remarks, Tim admits that,
…I am not arguing that I believe the Roman Catholic Church is the beast of Revelation, but am saying that one could make such an argument and make it forcefully. And of course, through the history of the church, many have made that argument.
For the reasons outlined above, I don’t believe the argument can be made logically, much less forcefully. But I don’t want to chastise Tim too harshly, especially since he admits that (like me) he has “never invested a lot of time or effort in examining the evidence” for eschatological positions. I hope that he will reconsider his post, and keep in mind the sage words he quotes from Stephen Nichols: "Overcoming what one brings to the text is, as many contemporary writings on hermeneutics conclude, not so easy, if even possible. Nonetheless, a reading of the text that is governed by what we bring to the text as opposed to what we find in the text is likely to lead to a misreading of the text."
Notes:
(1) My own view is that since there can be “many antichrists” it is possible that some individual Popes could rightfully be described as an “antichrist.” But as much as I disagree with the office of the papacy, I’m not sure the institution conveys that status on every Pope.
(2) Since I’m guessing, I would also add that my suspected candidate for the “Beast of Revelation” is Nero.
[Note: Once every few months something gets under my skin and I go off on a (mild) rant. Today is one of those days. It doesn't happen often so I hope that you will simply ignore this while I get a few things off my chest. In fact, I recommend skipping this post entirely and checking back later in the week.]
“Is Jack Bauer a Type of Christ?” asks Pastor Mark Driscoll on his blog, referring to the hero of the hit television show 24. “At the risk of sounding blasphemous, I would like to offer the suggestion that perhaps 24 is incredibly popular because Jack Bauer is a lot like Jesus,…”
From what I’ve heard about Driscoll, he sounds like a gifted preacher who has a unique ability to reach the lost. So it is painful to see him make such an idiotic blunder by making a comparison that is indeed not only blasphemous but downright stupid. (It will be equally painful to watch the fanboys come out of the woodwork to defend this nonsense.) The Savior of the World is irreverently compared to the Savior of Los Angeles.
Sadly, this is a common example of the way many Christians speak of Jesus when we are trying to be culturally “relevant” rather than being reverent. Our lack of reverence leads us to create God in our own image. Evangelicalism is particularly guilty of ignoring the holiness and transcendence of our Lord and Savior in favor of a God who is our “best friend”, exactly like us – only better. I remember as a young Baptist how we would gloss over the commands to “fear God” in favor of singing hymns about “What a Friend We Have in Jesus.”
Even the self-confessed Gnostic Harold Bloom is able to see where we err, as he wrote in his book "The American Religion":
The American finds God in herself or himself only after finding the freedom to know God by experiencing a total inward solitude. In this solitary freedom, the American is liberated both from other selves and from the created world. He comes to recognize that his spirit is itself uncreated. Knowing that he is the equal of God, the American Religionist can then achieve his true desideratum, mystical communion with his friend, the godhead.
Jesus is indeed our friend. But the idea that our relationship with Christ is not primarily Lord-to-servant but of Buddy-to-buddy is deeply rooted in our particular religious culture. Our lack of reverence expresses itself in everything from our worship to our evangelism. How many times, for instance, have we seen an earnest Christian approach someone (including, at times, other Christians) and ask, “Do you know Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior?”
While intended as a means of carrying out the Great Commission, the question is asking something else entirely. In essence, it's asking whether we possess God rather than whether God possess us. By claiming God as our “personal” friend we are putting him in the same category as our “personal trainers” and “personal assistants”, people who serve us, rather than someone whom we are expected to serve. When Jesus becomes someone we can befriend he becomes someone we can take lightly. We feel comfortable treating him as a mythical hero – like Jack Bauer.
Another problem with our strained attempt to be relevant is that, ironically, we become completely irrelevant. Why do we attempt to build connections on such ephemera as pop culture when we know how dated it will soon become? (“Jesus is like Gabe Kotter and the disciples are like the Sweathogs…”)
I suspect the one reason is simply laziness. It’s much easier to refer to a pop-culture Christ figure than it is to actually introduce someone to the actual figure of Christ. Another reason is that we feel the need to use pop culture as a tool for evangelism in order to justify our indulgences in such “lowbrow” entertainment. (Perhaps if we had a more robust theology of culture we’d develop a greater appreciation of its intrinsic worthy rather than attempting to draft it into the service of our evangelistic enterprises.)
But the most honest reason is likely to be that we are simply ashamed of the Gospel. We’re embarrassed to talk about how we serve a master who turns the other cheek, let’s people spit on him, abuse him, and even kill him. We’d much prefer a tough-guy Savior like Jack Bauer than the wimpy Jesus of the Gospels.
Or maybe we are not the ones who are ashamed since we think Christ is just peachy the way he is. But we know from experience that you can’t show that side of Christ to the lost because, well, Jesus just isn’t relevant.
Can anyone show me the passages in the Gospels that say we are to make Christ “relevant” to our culture?
You want to see relevant, read “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”, a sermon first preached in 1741 by one of the foremost intellectuals in American history, Jonathan Edwards:
They are now the objects of that very same anger and wrath of God, that is expressed in the torments of hell. And the reason why they do not go down to hell at each moment, is not because God, in whose power they are, is not then very angry with them; as he is with many miserable creatures now tormented in hell, who there feel and bear the fierceness of his wrath. Yea, God is a great deal more angry with great numbers that are now on earth: yea, doubtless, with many that are now in this congregation, who it may be are at ease, than he is with many of those who are now in the flames of hell.So that it is not because God is unmindful of their wickedness, and does not resent it, that he does not let loose his hand and cut them off. God is not altogether such an one as themselves, though they may imagine him to be so. The wrath of God burns against them, their damnation does not slumber; the pit is prepared, the fire is made ready, the furnace is now hot, ready to receive them; the flames do now rage and glow. The glittering sword is whet, and held over them, and the pit hath opened its mouth under them.
How many pastors today would dare preach such a sermon in a room full of Christians, much less during a “seeker-sensitive” service? Yet how many came to the Lord because of the boldness, the relevance, of Edward's preaching? Why do we avoid talking about eternal damnation and God's wrath? Are we afraid that if we do we won't be considered "hip" and "cool?" That we won't be relevant?
The lost don’t need cutesy pop-culture analogies, they need to know Christ. Jesus was relevant yesterday, he is relevant today, and he will be relevant forever. We Christians might realize this if we would kneel in reverence before our Savior rather than before the idol of relevance.
(HT: The Thinklings)
Update: After reading David Wayne's post Is Jack Bauer a Christ-Figure?, I realized that I had failed to make what I think is an important distinction.
David's title asks “Is Jack Bauer a Christ-Figure?” That is a question that I think is certainly worth exploring. But notice that it takes the form of “Is X a Christ-Figure?” In order to examine that question, we are comparing X to Christ. But if the simile is being used in order to help people understand who Jesus is, then the form becomes “Is Jesus a Jack Bauer-Figure?” This form requires an understanding of Jack Bauer and uses him as the frame of reference.
Now I’ve watched 24 and I’ve read the Gospels and for the life of me, I can’t find a relevant comparison. So what are those who know Jack Bauer but don’t know Jesus supposed to come away with from the simile?
After rereading Driscoll’s post, I realize that I may have misrepresented his point. Perhaps he was not speaking to non-Christians but to Christians. If so, I think his post is still dumb. But at least it wouldn’t be blasphemous.
And just so we're clear, I value the examination of Christ-figures in literature an popular culture (Neo, Superman, etc.). I believe, though, that they are primarily of value to those who know Christ. Otherwise, Christ just becomes a literary archetype rather than the flesh and blood Savior of the Cosmos.
Name: Charles “Chuck” Colson
Why you’ve heard of him: Colson was Richard Nixon’s “hatchet man” and spent seven months in prison for Watergate-related charges. Entered Alabama's Maxwell Prison in 1974 as a new Christian and became a staunch advocate for prisoners. After telling his story in the bestselling “Born Again”, Colson used the royalties to found Prison Fellowship, the world's largest outreach to prisoners, ex-prisoners, crime victims, and their families.
Position: Founder and Chairman of the Board for Prison Fellowship and Prison Fellowship International (1976 to present); Commentator for Breakpoint
Previous career:
Captain, U.S. Marine Corps (1953–55)
Assistant to the Assistant Secretary of the Navy (1955–56)
Admin. Asst. to U.S. Sen. Leverett Saltonstall (R-Mass.) (1956–61)
Partner, Gadsby and Hannah Law Firm (1961–69)
Special Counsel to President Richard M. Nixon (1969–73)
Partner, Colson and Shapiro Law Firm (1973–74)
Education:
B.A., Brown University (1953)
J.D. with honors, George Washington University (1959)
Area of expertise/interest: Restorative justice; worldview analysis and cultural criticism
Honors: Won the $1 million dollar Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion (the prize money was donated to Prison Fellowship); Born Again was made into a movie in 1978
Books: Colson has written over 20 books, including Born Again (1976), Kingdoms in Conflict (1987), The Body (1994), Loving God (1997), and How Now Shall We Live (w/ Nancy Pearcey) (2000)
Assessment: Other than St. Paul, there are few ex-prisoners who have done more to fulfill the duties of a Christian like Charles Colson. Along with Prison Fellowship, he has overseen the founding of Justice Fellowship (the nation's largest faith-based criminal justice reform group) and Angel Tree (a program that provides Christmas presents to more than 500,000 children of inmates annually on behalf of their incarcerated parents). The ministries now reach over 40,000 prisoners in 100 countries around the world.
As an author, Colson has written some of the most influential books in the evangelical community, including The Body and How Now Shall We Live? (both co-written with Nancy Pearcey). His Kingdoms in Conflict (1987), a centrist view of the relationship between church and state, is one of my personal favorites. He is also the co-author, along with Fr. Richard John Neuhaus of "Evangelicals and Catholics Together”, a seminal document that highlights how the two groups of orthodox Christians can work together while still respecting their profound theological differences.
While others have used the infamy of Watergate to line their own pockets, Colson donated all of his speaking honoraria and book royalties to Prison Fellowship and accepts only the salary of a mid-range ministry executive as compensation. The man who was once considered “Nixon’s evil genius” has become a model of Christian charity and service. Colson is truly a prime example of how God can transform a person’s life and use them for His purposes.
(This post is part of the "Know Your Evangelicals" series.)
Name: Jim Wallis
Why you’ve heard of him: Wallis is the leading voice of “progressive evangelicals.” He speaks at more than 200 events a year and his columns appear in the New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, and other major newspapers.
Position: Activist, speaker, and editor of Sojourners magazine; founder of Call to Renewal, a faith-based anti-poverty program.
Previous: Founder of Sojourners; Taught at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government.
Education:Attended seminary at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School
Area of interest/expertise:Ethics, social justice, and politics.
Regular contributor to: Sojourners
Books: The Soul of Politics (1994), Who Speaks for God? A New Politics of Compassion, Community, and Civility (1996), Call to Conversion (1992), Agenda for Biblical People (1984), and Revive Us Again (1983).
Assessment:Wallis is a staunch advocate on issues of “social justice” such as helping the poor. A large part of the conservative wing of evangelicalism has been shamefully inadequate in responding to Jesus command to help the poor, so Wallis is providing a much-needed corrective.
Unfortunately, his answer for how to respond is rooted more in antiquated and discredited leftist ideas than in the Bible. Government redistribution of wealth in not a Biblical idea, yet it appears to be the cornerstone of Wallis’ response to poverty. (His compassion also doesn’t appear to extend to the innocent civilians of Israel. Like most liberals, he pins the Palestine problem on the Israelis while ignoring the fact that they have refused offers to have their own state.)
While Wallis appears to be a genuine and passionate Christian he would do well to base his political views a bit more on the Bible and a bit less on leftist ideology.
Media citations:
NPR, Morality and the Presidential Election (Wallis discusses the upcoming election and gets in a spat with fellow guest Jerry Falwell.)
Newsday, Religion to have role at the polls
Washington Post, America's Christians less outraged than leaders opposing gay marriage
(This is #2 in the Know Your Evangelicals series.)
Having completed scholarly works on such diverse subjects as the calendar and Christian creeds, the Anglican Archbishop James Ussher combined his interest and in 1650 published a work in which he determined the exact date of Creation: 23 October, 4004 BC.
Other scholars, most notably the Cambridge academic John Lightfoot, had completed similar calculations, but Ussher’s work captured the popular imagination. The date was incorporated into an authorized version of the Bible printed in 1701 and, until the 1970s, could be found in the Bibles placed in hotel rooms by the Gideon’s Society.
Over the centuries the Ussher’s date of the creation became, for many Christians, an obvious deduction from Scripture itself. Even today many biblical Christians who believe in young earth creationism hold to a date very similar to the one calculated by the Irish bishop. But does the Bible provide clues that can help us determine the age of the earth? Can the genealogies found in Genesis and used by Ussher and others help us establish such a date?
The answer can be found in a dusty old theological journal from the late 1800s. Dr. William Henry Green, a Professor of Old Testament at Princeton Theological Seminary, published in Bibliotheca Sacra what should have become the definitive answer on the subject:
In 1863, I had occasion to examine the method and structure of the biblical genealogies, and incidentally ventured to remark that herein lay the solution of the whole matter. I said: "There is an element of uncertainty in a computation of time which rests upon genealogies, as the sacred chronology so largely does. Who is to certify us that the antediluvian and ante-Abrahamic genealogies have not been condensed in the same manner as the post-Abrahamic?... Our current chronology is based upon the prima facie impression of these genealogies.... the popular chronology is based upon a wrong interpretation, and that a select and partial register of ante-Abrahamic names has been mistaken for a complete one....
It can scarcely be necessary to adduce proof to one who has even a superficial acquaintance with the genealogies of the Bible, that they are frequently abbreviated by the omission of unimportant names. In fact, abridgment is the general rule, induced by the indisposition of the sacred writers to encumber their pages with more names than were necessary for their immediate purpose. This is so constantly the case, and the reason for it so obvious, that the occurrence of it need create no surprise anywhere, and we are at liberty to suppose it whenever anything in the circumstances of the case favors that belief.
Green provides a representative list of Biblical genealogies in which omissions are made (Matthew 1; Numbers 3:19, 27, 28; 1 Chronicles 26; Ezra 7:1-5; and Ezra 8:1-2). Indeed, his entire article on "Primeval Chronology" should be read in its entirety by anyone interested in the subject. But the gist of Green’s argument, which can be used to show why YEC'ers should not use genealogies to date the earth, can be gleaned in the following five points:
1. Comparison to other Biblical genealogies -- Abridgement and omission is found in numerous genealogical lists throughout the Bible. Unless there is outside evidence presented to show that Genesis 5 and 11 are intended to be continuous, there is no reason to assume that it is different that other genealogies.
2. Making unwarranted assumptions -- The author of Genesis provides the age of each patriarch at the birth of his son. Why would this information be included if the purpose was not to produce a chronology? While we may think this is a fair presumption to make, Green points out that the author never uses these numbers for that purpose. Not only does the writer not suggest their summation, but no other inspired writer of the Bible does so either. “There is no computation anywhere in Scripture of the time that elapsed from the creation or from the deluge, as there is from the descent into Egypt to the Exodus (Exod. 12:40), or from the Exodus to the building of the temple (1 Kings 6:1). And if the numbers in these genealogies are for the sake of constructing a chronology, why are numbers introduced which have no possible relation to such a purpose?”
3. It doesn’t match parallel texts -- If we assume that the author of Genesis was also the author of Exodus, then we can reasonably conclude that genealogies that are similarly constructed would be intended to have a similar design. Exod. 6:16-26, for example, records the genealogy extending from Levi to Moses and Aaron and includes the length of each man's life in the principal line of descent, viz., Levi (v. 16), Kohath (v. 18), Amram (v. 20). Green notes that the correspondence between this list and the ones in Genesis is “certainly remarkable”: “the numbers given in this genealogy exhibit the longevity of the patriarchs named, but cannot be so concatenated as to sum up the entire period; thus suggesting the inference that the numbers in the other genealogies, with which we are now concerned, were given with a like design, and not with the view of enabling the reader to construct the chronology.”
4. Different texts used different numbers -- The texts of the Septuagint (the ancient Greek translation of the Jewish scriptures) and of the Samaritan Pentateuch vary systematically from the Hebrew in both the genealogies of Genesis 5 and 11. For example, according to the chronologies based on these texts, the interval between the Flood and the birth of Abraham was 292 (Hebrew), 942 (Samaritan), or 1172 years (Septuagint). Ussher favored the Hebrew version yet doesn’t seem to grasp that the changes in the latter version were made in order to be more symmetrical; the redactors appear not to consider that that the ages are intended to produce a chronology.
5. The structure appears to define the purpose -- The structure of the genealogies in Genesis 5 and 11, argues Green, seem to indicate intentional arrangement: Each genealogy includes ten names, Noah being the tenth from Adam, and Terah the tenth from Noah. And each ends with a father having three sons, as is likewise the case with the Cainite genealogy (4:17-22). This structure is similar to Matthew 1, which breaks out into three periods of fourteen generations. “It is much more likely,” says Green, “that this definite number of names fitting into a regular scheme has been selected as sufficiently representing the periods to which they belong, than that all these striking numerical coincidences should have happened to occur in these successive instances.”
These points cast considerable doubt on the supposition that the genealogies in Genesis 5 and 11 were ever intended to be a direct chronology, much less one from which the age of the earth could be deduced. Based on this evidence alone, there is no reason to assume that our planet has only been around for 6,000 years.
But Bishop Ussher did derive his conclusion simply by adding up the “begats”. To determine the date he also referred to Chaldean history and the Astronomical Canon. If young-earth creationists wish to build a convincing case, they too must rely on outside evidence. The Bible itself doesn’t appear to lend them much support.
What is the gospel? What is the most serious threat to the gospel in the evangelical church today?
C.J. Mahaney, president of Sovereign Grace Ministries, posed those questions on his group blog, Together for the Gospel. Mahaney believes that because of doctrinal deficiencies expressed in American evangelicalism, we can’t assume that the gospel is clearly understood: “Confusion about the content of the gospel is evident across the evangelical landscape.”
At the risk of exposing my own confusion and showing that I too am deficient in understanding the gospel, I’d like to share my perspective on these questions.
What is the gospel? The gospel--the "good news"--is news about Jesus Christ.
What is the most serious threat to the gospel in the evangelical church today? The church’s simplism of the gospel; narrowing the aboutness of Christ in order to make it presentable in a way that is formulaic and manageable.
For example, biblical passages such as John 3:16 or Ephesians 2:4-6 are often referred to as “the gospel in a nutshell.” By referring to these verses we can provide a simple summation of the “gospel”, allowing us to “witness” to those with short-attention spans. But as life-altering, world-shatteringly important as those verses are—and I cannot overemphasize just how good that news is for us---the gospel cannot be squeezed into a “nutshell.”
Indeed, the entire universe is not large enough to contain the good news about Jesus! The gospel is more than just news for fallen man. Even if there were no anthropos or no cosmos the seraphim would still proclaim the good news about Christ. The gospel is greater than just the redemption of fallen human nature, greater than the redemption of all creation. The gospel is not about me and it is not about you. The gospel is the news in toto about the Savior, Redeemer, and Sustainer of creation: Jesus Christ.
The most serious threat to the gospel is, therefore, the attempts to limit the gospel about Jesus to a propositional truth, to a narrative, to a story, to a verse, a book, to a Bible, or to a million other “nutshells.” True, the gospel is contained in all of those forms. But any attempt to share the gospel that does not proceed from “the gospel is…” to “but the gospel is also…” is simply inadequate. Even if we were able to proclaim all the news that is contained in those nutshells, though, it would not exhaust the good news about Christ.
The good news about Jesus is not limited to what he did in the land of Israel. The good news about Jesus is not limited to what has done throughout the history of the church. The good news about Jesus is not limited to what he is now doing in our own lives. The good news about Jesus has no limits; it is what he did yesterday, what he is doing today, and what he will do forever. The news about Jesus Christ is a song that preceded the foundation of the earth and will be joyfully and everlastingly sung in the new creation.
This is the reason I call myself an “evangelical Christian.” I want to be counted as one of the chorus who will sing about the good news of Christ with my lips, my soul, my very being. I want to share the gospel, the good news, the euangelion, now and forever.
"Salt is good; but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltness be restored? It is fit neither for the land nor for the dunghill; men throw it away. He who has ears to hear, let him hear." Luke 14:34-45 (RSV)
Throughout history salt has been one of the basic compounds necessary for life. Yet in our modern age it is difficult to imagine just how important the simple mineral was for preserving food. In ancient Israel salt was obtained by evaporating water from the Dead Sea. The process produces not only pure salt (sodium chloride), but other chlorides such as potassium and magnesium. If the evaporated salt crystals are not separated from the other chlorides they attract moisture and dissolve, causing the compound to lose its saltiness and become useless.
What remains is a compound that is completely useless, even harmful. The chemicals poison the soil and even throwing them on the manure pile risk future contamination when the material is used for fertilizer. Saltless salt is worth less even than manure.
In his Sermon on the Mount, Jesus referred to the crowd as the “salt of the earth.” His point was that just as salt prevents the deterioration of meat, his followers should serve as a preserving influence, impeding the deterioration of their society. But what happens when the salt refuses to be separate and distinct? What happens when the salt loses it saltiness?
I was reminded of that question after reading a blog post by Brian McLaren. As the most influential leader of the controversial emergent church movement, he has received more than his share of criticism. Because of this I’ve been hesitatant to pile on, even though I’ve often had concerns about his work. But a recent blog post on the “homosexual question” forces me to ask: Has McLaren become a saltless servant?
Although it’s the impetus for his post, homosexuality really isn’t the issue I’m concerned about. In fact, I believe that homosexuality is one of the most overrated sins in our culture. Relative to other sexual sins--such as heterosexual fornication, adultery, and divorce--homosexual practice is relatively uncommon. Because it is such a niche sin, it has become an issue on which Christians spend an inordinate amount of time and energy. The reason, as Philip Yancey notes, is that Christians tend to get very angry towards others who sin differently than they do.
But we must admit that for a behavior that is engaged by a small minority of the population, homosexuality has an oversized influence on our culture. From crude jokes on the playground to the oral arguments in the state courts, the subject of homosexuality is pervasive. The only way in which talk of homosexuality can't be tolerated is when it is by those who can't tolerate homosexuality. One of the last remaining taboos in our culture is to consider homosexual behavior taboo.
Because conservative Christians are one of the few groups that take this unpopular stand, it often demarcates the line between us and the larger culture. For both sides of the “culture war” it has become a Maginot Line, sealing each group off from the other. Some Christians do break ranks and follow the biblical warrant by reaching out to their fellow sinners across the moral divide. Others have chosen to defect to the other side, justifying the behavior because the culture has judged it to be acceptable.
Both sides of the Maginot Line are populated by sinners; the only significant difference is that those who condone homosexuality are deluding themselves—and others—about its sinful nature. Unfortunately, Brian McLaren doesn’t have the courage to be truly counter-cultural and so has chosen to stand on the side of the line of the cultural apologists.
In his post, McLaren shares a story about an engaged couple who visit the church where his serves as a pastor. After the service the couples approach him and ask where his church stands on homosexuality. McLaren begins his response by pointing out that this isn’t the first time he’s been asked this question:
Usually when I'm asked about this subject, it's by conservative Christians wanting to be sure that we conform to what I call "radio-orthodoxy," i.e. the religio-political priorities mandated by many big-name religious broadcasters.
What McLaren calls “radio-orthodoxy” many of us call “Biblical Christianity.” After all, it is the Bible, not the “big-name religious broadcasters” that provide the “mandate” on the issue.
He goes on to explain why he is reluctant to answer the question:
I hesitate in answering "the homosexual question" not because I'm a cowardly flip-flopper who wants to tickle ears, but because I am a pastor, and pastors have learned from Jesus that there is more to answering a question than being right or even honest: we must also be . . . pastoral. That means understanding the question beneath the question, the need or fear or hope or assumption that motivates the question.
While McLaren may be right that we learn from Jesus that there is more to answering a question that being right or even being honest, there is at least that much. I don’t recall Jesus ever saying that being “pastoral” meant ignoring the question in order to get to what motivates the question. The few times Jesus refused to answer a question directly it was because he was being challenged by the self-righteous Pharisees, rather than by an honest seekers from the pews. Also, I don’t recall Jesus ever refusing to call sinners to repentance.
We pastors want to frame our answer around that need; we want to fit in with the Holy Spirit's work in that person's life at that particular moment. To put it biblically, we want to be sure our answers are "seasoned with salt" and appropriate to "the need of the moment" (Col. 4; Eph. 4).
I’m not a pastor so maybe I am unclear on what is needed at such times. But I’ve always thought that the most basic “need of the moment” for someone struggling with a question of sin was repentance and the forgiveness that only Jesus can give. Has the post-modern condition changed the need of the moment?
Most of the emerging leaders I know share my agony over this question. We fear that the whole issue has been manipulated far more than we realize by political parties seeking to shave percentage points off their opponent's constituency. We see whatever we say get sucked into a vortex of politicized culture-wars rhetoric--and we're pastors, evangelists, church-planters, and disciple-makers, not political culture warriors. Those who bring us honest questions are people we are trying to care for in Christ's name, not cultural enemies we're trying to vanquish.
If this is true, and the emerging leaders agonize over calling sinful behavior that the Bible claims is sinful, then maybe the resounding condemnation of the movement is duly warranted. McLaren appears to be more concerned that someone might mistake him for a Republican than he does in acting as a servant of God’s word. If people bring you honest questions then they deserve to have a pastor provide an honest Biblical answer.
Frankly, many of us don't know what we should think about homosexuality. We've heard all sides but no position has yet won our confidence so that we can say "it seems good to the Holy Spirit and us." That alienates us from both the liberals and conservatives who seem to know exactly what we should think.
This is the point where I lost all faith in McLaren. I’ve heard him refer to himself as an “evangelical” yet if he doesn’t seem to consider Scripture to be authoritative. The Bible is clear that homosexual behavior is a sin. The church, for the past two millennia, has never had doubts that homosexual behavior is a sin. For McLaren and his “emerging leaders” to express doubts now shows that they are more concerned about accommodating culture than they are with submitting to the Bible or the collective wisdom of the Bride of Christ.
Even if we are convinced that all homosexual behavior is always sinful, we still want to treat gay and lesbian people with more dignity, gentleness, and respect than our colleagues do.
This is one of numerous examples where McLaren has attempted to make clear that he’s a different sort of Pharisee. He’s not like those tax collectors, his “colleagues” who have the audacity to call on sinners to repent before they join the “conversation.” He’s different. He’s a New Kind of Christian.
If we think that there may actually be a legitimate context for some homosexual relationships, we know that the biblical arguments are nuanced and multilayered, and the pastoral ramifications are staggeringly complex. We aren't sure if or where lines are to be drawn, nor do we know how to enforce with fairness whatever lines are drawn.
The biblical arguments are “nuanced and layered?” If so, then why didn’t anyone notice this over, oh, the past 20 centuries? Why do most Bible-believing Christians think it is rather straightforward and clear?
Perhaps we need a five-year moratorium on making pronouncements. In the meantime, we'll practice prayerful Christian dialogue, listening respectfully, disagreeing agreeably.
Why stop there? Why not call a five-year moratorium on making any pronouncements about sin? We’ll just practice prayerful Christian dialogue, listen respectfully, disagree agreeably, and when God asks us why we didn’t stand up for the truth of his word we’ll just tell Him we were busy having a “conversation.”
When decisions need to be made, they'll be admittedly provisional. We'll keep our ears attuned to scholars in biblical studies, theology, ethics, psychology, genetics, sociology, and related fields.
Who needs Sola Scriptura when you have psychology, genetics, and sociology? What does it matter what that old fogey Paul has to say about the matter. It’s much more important that we listen to Spong, Singer, Freud, Dawkins, and E.O. Wilson instead.
Then in five years, if we have clarity, we'll speak; if not, we'll set another five years for ongoing reflection. After all, many important issues in church history took centuries to figure out. Maybe this moratorium would help us resist the "winds of doctrine" blowing furiously from the left and right, so we can patiently wait for the wind of the Spirit to set our course.
Somehow the church failed to heed the wind of the Spirit for the past two thousand years. But now that we have Pastor McLaren leading an emerging church, the still small voice of the Holy Spirit will surely set us straight. Just out of curiosity, does anyone think that if the Spirit will lead McLaren and his ilk to think that homosexual behavior is (as Scripture makes clear) sinful? Yeah, me neither.
Welcome to our world. Being "right" isn't enough. We also need to be wise. And loving. And patient. Perhaps nothing short of that should "seem good to the Holy Spirit and us."
McLaren is right; being right isn’t enough. We do need to be wise, and loving, and patient. And most of all we need to follow the Holy Spirit’s guidance as he illuminates God’s word. We can start by taking another look at Luke 14: Salt is good; but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltness be restored?
When we have sold out Scripture in order to join the “conversation” we have lost our saltiness. When we have pastors that refuse to call sinners to repentance but prefer a “moratorium on making pronouncements” we are not fit even for the dunghill. When we have lost our ability to act as a preservative in a decaying culture we can no longer be the “salt of the earth.” When we refuse to take a stand against sin, we become nothing more than saltless servants of our culture.
(HT: Boar's Head Tavern)
Name: Dallas Willard
Why you’ve heard of him: While Dr. Willard isn’t widely known outside of his academic field, his books and articles have had a profound impact within evangelical circles.
Position: Professor in the School of Philosophy at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles.
Previous: He has taught at USC since 1965, where he was Director of the School of Philosophy from 1982-1985. He has also taught at the University of Wisconsin (Madison, 1960-1965), and has held visiting appointments at UCLA (1969) and the University of Colorado (1984).
Education:
Tennessee Temple College (B.A., 1956, Psychology)
Baylor University (B.A., 1957, Philosophy and Religion)
Baylor University and the University of Wisconsin (Ph. D., 1964: Major in Philosophy, Minor in the History of Science)
Area of interest/expertise: Spiritual disciplines, Christian discipleship, epistemology, the philosophy of mind and of logic, the philosophy of Edmund Husserl
Books: Hearing God: Developing a Conversational Relationship With God (1999), The Spirit of the Disciplines: Understanding How God Changes Lives (1998), The Divine Conspiracy: Rediscovering Our Hidden Life in God (1998), Renovation of the Heart: Putting on the Character of Christ (2002)
Assessment: At a time when most critics were decrying the loss of the “evangelical mind”, Dr. Willard was quietly working to restore our intellectual dignity. As a philosopher, he has provided an example of how to thrive in the often hostile environment of academia while maintaining his allegiance to a Christian worldview. As an author and speaker, Willard has helped to restore the focus on the spiritual disciplines and discipleship in the life of evangelicals.
Articles on the Web: on Christianity and on Philosophy
Essential Articles:
Jesus The Logician Christian Scholar's Review, 1999, Vol. XXVIII, #4, 605-614.
"Knowledge and Naturalism,” In Naturalism: A Critical Analysis, edited by William Lane Craig and J. P. Moreland (London: Routledge, 2000), 51 pp.
"Why Bother With Discipleship?" RENOVARE Perspective, Vol. V, No. 4. First published in a Biola University bulletin.
The Key to the Keys of the Kingdom
(This is #3 in the Know Your Evangelicals series.)
Perhaps it is due to my own observer bias, but it appears that over the past several months there has been a marked increase in the level of bickering and dissension among Christian bloggers. Arguments over doctrine, of course, have been around as long as believers have been blogging. And with over 10,000 Protestant denominations it's not surprising that such differences find their way online.
What I believe is unique and disconcerting is the way such trivial disputes have come to dominate general discourse. We’ve always had the frothing malcontents who spend all their time debating such issues as whether “Reformed Baptist” is an oxymoron or whether John Calvin can really be considered a Calvinist. Historically, these people have been treated as harmless comic relief or cautionary examples of what happens when you put denominational allegiance ahead of the Gospel. But lately it appears that even generally irenic bloggers have entered the fray to bash their fellow Christians.
Since I wrote on this topic in a related context several months ago I’ve decided to repost that entry in order to open it up for further discussion. I believe that we must find a way to address this behavior which has inexplicably become commonplace yet is explicitly condemned by Scripture. How do we hold our fellow Christian bloggers accountable? How do we respond to this “talk-radio”-style of debate in which no disagreement on even inessential matters (i.e., should churches be open on Christmas?) can be tolerated?
Over the past thirty-six years I’ve been, at one time or another, a pre-post-a-millennialist, dispensational-covenantal, semi-charismatic, Reformed-Arminian, Wesleyan-Calvinist attending a Southern/Independent/Fundamentalist Baptist, Free-Methodist/Free-Evangelical, Presbyterian (USA/PCA), Pentecostal/Assembly of God, Bible/non-denominational church. I’ve sipped grape juice from glass thimbles and red wine from gold-plated goblets while eating pieces of saltine crackers and chips of unleavened bread, I’ve had “dinner on the ground” with a pew’s worth of believers and shared feasts with a stadium full of megachurch patrons. I’ve listened to seminary-educated pastors parse Greek verbs and heard semi-illiterate Mexican preachers deliver sermons in Spanish.
Over three dozen churches still have me on the roles as a “member.”
With my experience I can talk to any fellow Christian about doctrine and scripture and within ten minutes can tell you a dozen things wrong with their theology. Given another ten minutes I can explain to them in graphic detail where they err. Whether the topic is baptism (“…you gotta dunk ‘em down real good to wash away all this sin…”), the emergent church (“…let me tell ya what’s wrong with that McLaren guy…”), eschatology (“Rapture? The Bible don’t say nothin’ about no...”), or any other issues that has ever caused a Protestant to start their own denomination, I can jump in with my well-formed, incontrovertible opinion. I’m always willing to look past the mote in my own eye to help a brother get that speck out of his own. That’s just the kind of guy I am.
At least I used to be. I find that I just don’t have the stomach for those old arguments anymore. I’m still willing to discuss doctrinal differences. But now I’m less sure that I’m standing on the right side of scripture. Is the view heretical or likely to lead someone away from salvation? Then I’ll fight it tooth-and-nail. If not, then I’ll have to sit it out. I no longer have an interest in being what Anthony Bradley calls a “wife beater”:
I actually know guys who are primarily concerned with wearing wife beaters not to beat their wives but to beat up on the bride of Jesus: the church. Seriously, I know men, many men, who focus almost exclusively on fighting battles within the church and Christianity. These sick freaks think its fun to fight with other Christians about theology, church practice, etc., just to fight. That's pretty much all they care about. This is the Enemy's strategy to keep many gifted men out of the Great Battle. Ever read C.S. Lewis' Screwtape Letters?
Hold on, dear contrarians, as I know your fingers are twitching to respond with venom, exceptions, and "yeah, but. . .," this does not mean that some men should not be working hard to keep the church pure in it's doctrine and practice. Paul does commend us to "watch our doctrine closely" and SOME guys are called to this but MOST are not.
“This is slap boxing,” adds Bradley, “The guys fighting in the Great Battle spend their time warring for the hearts of real people trapped in brokenness, sin, misguided thinking, destructive habits.” Like Bradley, I’m disturbed by the number of Christian men – and it’s almost always men – who waste their intellectual gifts fighting with fellow believers. Perhaps we need to have lengthy critical examinations of such issues as paedobaptism or predestination. But how many people truly believe God intends for them to spend a large bulk of their time, energy, and intellect correcting other Christians who might take a different view?
Jonathan Barlow believes that the problem stems from the “critique-culture” within evangelical circles:
We [evangelicals] rarely do anything positive, and when we do, positive just doesn't sell. I don't have a good answer for a way forward, but I think a good first step is trying to lay off of brothers in other Christian traditions for the most part, especially those who hold to Nicene orthodoxy. Secondly, when our bright students are interested in a thinker outside of our circles, we teachers and pastors should model a kind of engagement that praises where it can, and suggests alternatives where it cannot.
There was a time when the issues was merely about the correct doctrine, the acceptable teachers, and the denominationally-approved books. The advent of the blogosphere, though, has not only expanded the reach of the critique-culture but has added new ways in which we can criticize each other’s activities. I can’t think of a single blogging initiative – the GodBlogCon, Blogs4God, the Blogdom of God – involving Christians that hasn’t been roundly criticized by our own brothers and sisters. This is not to say that any venture should be immune from criticism. But there comes a point when the knee-jerk critiques simply lead to paralysis.
Is there anything that Christians do that will not earn them criticism by other Christians? We complain about both church growth initiatives and stagnation in the pews. We whine about both the conformity of mainstream evangelicalism and the dangers of the emergent church movement. We warn against both the church being too involved in politics and against the church not doing enough prevent state-sanctioned injustice. We even have Calvinists being criticized by Hyper-Calvinists for not holding closely enough to the strictures of Calvinism – while never having bothered to actually read the works of John Calvin!
Where does it end? When will we stop being “wife beaters” of Christ’s bride? And when will we finally heed the exhortation of Titus to, "Avoid foolish controversies and genealogies and arguments and quarrels about the law, because these are unprofitable and useless."
(HT: Gideon Strauss)
During the summer of 2001, I spent hundreds of hours debating the doctrine of inerrancy in an online forum. Because I was almost always the only Christian taking part in the discussions I became the object of ridicule, invective, scorn. About the only thing I had in common with the other denizens of the forum was a rudimentary knowledge of Biblical scholarship. The most knowledgeable member of the group was a retired English teacher and evangelical atheist named Farrell Till. Till claimed to have studied “Biblical errancy” for over thirty years yet knew less Greek and Hebrew than a first-year seminarian.
The debates were heated, intricate, lengthy, and almost always completely irrelevant. It took the tragedy of 9/11 to fully wake me from my dogmatic slumbers and recognize that such flame wars masquerading as debate are a complete waste of time. I realized that inerrancy is rooted in other doctrines such as Biblical authority, inspiration, and pneumatology and that without these foundations any discussion on the topic would be futile. Never again will I waste time attempting to convince a non-believer that the Bible is without error.
Convincing my fellow believers, however, is another matter altogether. I remain firmly of the opinion that inerrancy, properly understood, is the most humble position a believer can take in regards to the Bible. Rather than attempt to defend the doctrine directly, though, I want to recommend a particular epistemic stance toward Scripture. (David Wayne, who has an uncanny ability to explain theological concepts with astounding depth and simplicity, has written a post on the doctrine that mirrors my own position. I highly recommend that post as a corrective to the many misunderstandings that people seem to have about what the technical term inerrancy really means.)
Let’s begin with a pair of questions: Is it possible for there to exist a book (or collection of books) which makes no false affirmations, assertions, or claims? Furthermore, is it possible that there could exist a divinely inspired (or collection of books) which makes no false affirmations, assertions, or claims? For an orthodox Christian to claim that both of these are impossible would be inconceivable; such a contention would be evidence of either foggy-reasoning or excessive hubris.
Because we will agree that it is possible, the question becomes whether we have reason to believe that such a divinely inspired book (or collection of books) which make no false affirmations, assertions, or claims actually exists in reality. The inerrantists answers yes, and contends that the Bible fits this criteria. The non-inerrantists answers no, and believes that the Bible contains at least one false affirmation, assertion, or claim.
In the previous post on Scriptural authority, I claimed that the Holy Spirit provides a rational, reasonable, non-circular reason for believing that the Bible is true. While all orthodox Christians believe the Bible to be at least somewhat normative, the degree to which we believe that the Bible is authoritative can have a profound impact on our view of inerrancy. Philosopher Douglas Blount provides an example of how holding a high regard for Biblical authority can affect our responses:
If its reasonable for me to believe you to be a thoroughly reliable witness, then its reasonable for me to reject almost anything which conflicts with your testimony; so also, if it’s reasonable for us to believe that Scripture is inerrant (and thus thoroughly reliable), its reasonable for us to reject almost any statement which conflicts with what it asserts. [emphasis in original]
The innerantist believes that Scripture is thoroughly reliable and therefore has a high degree of confidence in its authority. The non-inerrantist, however, does not believe that Scripture is completely reliable and thus believes that it is subordinate to another form of authority (rationality, history, tradition, Church teachings, etc.). Both groups, however, accept that our credulity is not without limits. For example, if Scripture were to make statements which are (a) inconsistent either with other statements that it makes or with (b) claims which we have reasons for believing which outweigh our reason for believing Scripture to be inerrant, then we would have a reason to give up the belief that the Bible is a thoroughly reliable witness.
On both points the inerrantists takes the more humble approach. For instance, in regards to (a), we can point out that theologians throughout the church’s history have believed that the Bible is without error. Of course it is logically possible that a modern non-inerrantist has found inconsistencies that managed to slip past the notice of Augustine, Calvin, Luther, and other students of the Bible. But the inerrantist is naturally skeptical of such claims.
But what if the non-inerrantist has a reason for rejecting inerrancy that is not based on internal textual inconsistencies but rather based on outside evidence? Holding such a belief requires examination of other questions: How can they distinguish which areas of the Bible are in error and which are not? By what authority are the judging Scripture and is that that authority inerrant? If not, then on what basis can it be claimed to take precedence over Scriptural authority?
The non-inerrantists may have solid, Biblically-sound answers to these questions so I don’t want to imply that rejecting the doctrine of inerrancy is evidence of hubris. I also do not want to claim that this is an essential doctrine on which all Christians must conform, for I am unclear on where the line of orthodoxy should be drawn on this issue. Still, I would commend any Christian to carefully search their heart for evidence of epistemic pride before disregarding this doctrine. I am not an infallible judge so I cannot say who is right and who is wrong. But as for me and my house, we prefer to err on the side of inerrancy.
For five days in 1979 I was considered an expert on the Bible.
Although I was humble about my status, my fellow pre-seminarians at East Cisco Baptist Church Vacation Bible School were awed by the agility with which I wielded my knowledge. We would sit restlessly through the flannelgraph stories of Noah and David, waiting for the event that would put my considerable skills to the test: Bible speed drills.
Because besting an opponent often requires beating them to the Scriptural punch, we young Baptists were quizzed on our ability to quickly find any passage in the Bible. Our instructor would call out an obscure book such as Habakkuk or Colossians or Nezeriah (that one was to keep us on our toes) and we would furiously race to be the first to find the chapter and verse. The winner of each round earned a gold star.
To say I was good at Bible Speed Drill would be an understatement. I was the best, the undisputed champ, not only of VBS but of the entire city of Cisco. I was confident that I could handily beat any of the other 4,516 residents in town, especially the Methodists and Catholics who, my Pentecostal neighbor assured me, never opened a Bible at all. My record spoke for itself; I had more stars than the Andromeda galaxy. I was clearly an expert on Scripture.
My claim to being a theological prodigy, however, was short-lived. The deeper I delved into the Bible – which required reading past the index page -- the more I realized I was utterly clueless.
Initially, I believed I could regain my esteemed status by years of study and accumulation of Biblical knowledge. As Jacob had wrestled with the angel, I continued to grapple with Scripture. But unlike the patriarch I quickly lost the fight, pinned in the first round by the sheer weight of the Bible’s magisterial beauty and truth. I quickly realized that I had the wrong footing. I recognized that I must submit to Jesus Christ, the lord and king of the entire cosmos. Similarly, I realized I wasn’t called to be an authority on Scripture but rather to recognize that the Bible itself was an authority unto which I must yield.
Scripture, of course, is not Christ. Yet Christ can only be truly and properly known through the revelation presented in Scripture. Theologian Alister McGrath notes that Scripture is regarded as a channel through which God’s self-revelation in Jesus Christ is encountered. Faith accepts Scripture as a testimony to Christ, and submits to Christ as the one of whom Scripture speaks. Our epistemological warrant for knowledge about Christ is predicated on accepting the testimony of the Gospel. As the enthymeme disguised as a children’s hymn explains: Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so.
But is it enough to believe simply because “the Bible tells me so?” Isn’t it circular reasoning to claim that Scripture is authoritative based on the Bible’s claims about itself? And is it rational to believe something on the grounds that Scripture affirms it? To answer these questions let’s examine the reasons for believing the claim made in the song “Jesus Loves Me.”
While it might not appear to be an argument, the first line (“Jesus loves me”) is actually a conclusion based on the premise “the Bible tells me so’ (specifically, John 3:16). For us to accept that the premise is rational it must be true that (a) the means by which one arrives at a particular truth are quite likely to lead to truth and (b) one has no convincing reason for giving up that belief. If both of these conditions are met then it is reasonable for one to hold that belief, otherwise it is not.*
Since I am still a Christian I obviously have not found a convincing reason for giving up the belief in this premise. Whether I should believe it is rational must therefore depend on how I arrived at this truth. The answer is that I was lead to believe it by the Holy Spirit. Not only does the Bible tell me so, but God himself has testified to the veracity of the claim. Assuming that the Spirit has in fact guided me to believe the premise, then I have a rational, reasonable, non-circular reason for believing that the Bible is true.
Because God has provided immediate (direct, without an intermediary agent) confirmation for me that his mediate special revelation (Scripture) is true, I find that I can do nothing else but humbly and reverently submit to the power of his Word. To do anything else would be to replace the divinely inspired authority with one based on a creational norm, such as culture or tradition.
Almost all who call themselves Christian, of course, consider the teachings of Christ to be normative and authoritative. Where evangelicals differ from some other believers, as McGrath contends, is that we insist that our allegiance to Christ as Lord includes acceptance of his attitude to Scripture. In my next post I’ll address Christ’s view of Scripture and examine what I believe to be the connection between authority, inspiration, and inerrancy.
*This criteria of rationality is borrowed from philosopher Douglas Blount’s essay “The Authority of Scripture” in Reasons for the Hope Within
According to a profile in Christianity Today entitled "The Positive Prophet," the liberal evangelical Tony Campolo would often begin a speech by saying:
"I have three things I'd like to say today. First, while you were sleeping last night, 30,000 kids died of starvation or diseases related to malnutrition. Second, most of you don't give a sh*t. What's worse is that you're more upset with the fact that I said sh*t than the fact that 30,000 kids died last night."
Although Campolo is overstating the point, he is right that evangelicals often take great offense to the use of such language and are surprised when it is used by Christians. I was reminded of this fact while reading a review of the film “To End All Wars” by my friend Tim Challies. Before delving into his critique, Tim offers a warning:
I was quite surprised at the volume of swearing in this film. Usually I would not be surprised to find bad language in a war movie, but was surprised at this one primarily because the people who recommended it to me made no mention of it. Thankfully, because of the subject matter, it was not a film we decided to watch with the children present.
In expressing his views on swearing in an earlier post, Tim wrote, “I believe the answer is quite clear that cussing, swearing, using vulgar speech does NOT please God in any way. It’s the way of the world, it’s the language of the former man, the spiritually dead man.” Later in the post he adds, “The only “proper context” for using such language, i