On Birthdays
April 17, 2009 at 1:11 pm (Culture, Faith, Family)
Calvin has some interesting thoughts on birthdays in his commentary on the synoptic Gospels, volume 2, page 225:
The ancient custom of observing a birth-day every year as an occasion of joy cannot in itself be disapproved; for that day, as often as it returns, reminds each of us to give thanks to God, who brought us into this world, and has permitted us, in his kindness, to spend many years in it; next, to bring to our recollection how improperly and uselessly the time which God granted to us has been permitted to pass away; and, lastly, that we ought to commit ourselves to the protection of the same God for the remainder of our life.
Unfashionable
April 2, 2009 at 8:06 am (Books (reviews and recommendations), Church, Culture)
Tullian Tchividjian has just written a book by that name, and it will be available at the WTS bookstore sometime this month. I got a pre-pub copy and read it very eagerly. A book that has encomiums by J.I. Packer, Ravi Zacharias, Michael Horton, Kent Hughes, Luder Whitlock, Thabiti Anyabwile, and D.A. Carson (among many others!) ought at least to hold my attention. I was not disappointed.
The book is about Christians relating to culture. There are many books available on this now, many of them outstandingly scholarly. This one fills the niche of saying those things that Carson and Wells (for instance) say in a way that a brand new believer can understand. And the message is exactly what the modern church needs to hear. The book may be summarized by Jesus’ proverb that the church needs to be in the world but not of the world. Fortunately, Tchividjian spends most of his time on the “not of the world,” since that seems to be the greater danger in the church today. Churches think that they need to be “relevant,” and so that usually means looking just like the world. But if the church looks just like the world, it is no longer relevant, argues Tchividjian. Salt can only be salt is if it is not the same thing as that which it is trying to salt. And yet, on the balance side, salt cannot salt unless it is in close contact with that which it is trying to salt. So Tchividjian gets this balance exactly right. Tchividjian obviously cares a great deal about this subject; his passion is evident. The book is therefore a clarion call to churches to be rooted in God’s truth, which is perennially relevant, even though unfashionable. Also laudable is his emphasis on the Christian faith permeating every aspect of who we are and what we do. We don’t check out Christianity at the door, as if it was a borrowed library book that we have to leave at the library when we leave. Instead, when we leave church on Sunday morning, we enter the mission field, whatever vocation one might have.
I have only a few questions for Tullian concerning this book. First, piggy-backing on his laudable balance of truth and unity, I was wondering if he could be a bit more specific about what constitutes truth. Obviously, there are many factors in our quest for catholic (small “c”) unity. A PCA church can have a greater unity with a Calvinistic Baptist church than it can with a Roman Catholic Church; and a greater unity with a NAPARC church than with a Calvinistic Baptist church, and a greater unity yet with a PCA church than with, say, even an OPC church. My question is this: what is the basis for each of these different levels of unity? All these groups would claim to believe the Bible and would claim the Bible as at least a standard, and most would claim it as the final standard for truth. My question really aims at the confessions. Are the Westminster standards our basis for unity in the PCA? He quotes a post written by Reggie Kidd which is certainly directed against certain kinds of confessional voices in the PCA. Indeed, that post was heavily modified (and retracted, it is important to note) from its original version, which had brutally attacked several well-known voices in the PCA arguing for confessional teaching. Does Tchividjian agree with that kind of assessment of confessional thinking or not? Understand that I am not presuming the answer one way or another, nor am I saying that this was a lapse on Tchividjian’s part in the book. His argument was to keep the balance between truth and unity. Amen to that. And you cannot say everything in a small book. But it does compel us to ask the next question about confessional truth.
The book should be read. I think it is the easiest entrance into the question of Christianity and culture that we have. It is eminently sane and biblical. And I would like to thank Tullian for writing it.
Global Reformed Theology
February 10, 2009 at 4:40 pm (Church, Culture, Theology, Westminster standards)
In today’s world, the question will naturally arise, though not in the minds of many Reformed theologians, of the nature of Reformed theology and belief in a world where Christianity is shifting to the South and the East. There are many more Christians now in Africa and Asia than in the West. What was representative for Christianity used to be Western, American or European. However, now the picture is different. What does that mean for the Reformed faith? Questions arise concerning the whole approach to theology as well as the confessions.
Certainly, it is necessary for the Reformed world to wake up to this reality. For instance, the Presbyterian Church in Brazil has many more members than the PCA. Even the PCA (which is the largest English-speaking Reformed denomination in the world) is only middlin when it comes to Reformed churches in the world.
One of the main concerns that I have whenever I see attempts to address this question is that social concerns are in danger of swamping the Gospel message. For instance, when people address the Reformed Gospel’s progress in Africa, it tends to be related closely to things like apartheid. Now, the Reformed Gospel has very important ramifications for something like apartheid. However, the Gospel is not to be made equivalent to any particular position with regard to apartheid. Racial reconciliation is a result of the Gospel, not a component of it.
Similarly, is the Westminster Confession of Faith too narrow, too precise, and just too British for the South and the East? Not at all. If we really believe that it is a summary of biblical teaching, then it has no racial or cultural boundaries, anymore than the Gospel itself does. For if we confess that the Westminster Standards contain THE system of doctrine taught in Holy Scripture (and not just A system), then we must equate our understanding of the Gospel with the Standards. The Standards are intended to be our confession of what the Gospel is. As such, it addresses the whole human race, and the human sin problem. The solution for sin is the same no matter what race a person is.
Job and Bunyan Versus The Shack
January 7, 2009 at 4:27 pm (Apologetics, Atheism, Books (reviews and recommendations), Christology, Culture, Faith, Heresy, Holy Spirit, Jesus)
The book entitled The Shack has been a marketing phenomenon among “evangelicals.” Blurbs compare the Shack to Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress. I am here to tell you that the hype is a bit forced. Let’s do a bit of comparison, first with the book of Job, then with Bunyan, interjecting a bit of C.S. Lewis in for fun.
The Shack is the story of a man whose beautiful daughter is brutally murdered. The man leaves the faith, only to receive a message from God to meet him at the shack, the very place where his daughter was murdered. He then meets God. The Father is a big jolly black woman, the Son is a Jewish carpenter, and the Holy Spirit is a wispy, mysterious Asian woman (we’ll get to that blasphemy in a moment). The upshot of the plot is that God explains to the main character the why’s and the wherefore’s, and the man is healed. The theological upshot is that God is good, but not all-powerful. Young takes Rabbi Kushner’s prong of the dilemma. What is important to notice here is a combination of rationalism and experientalism. On the one hand, Young tears at the heart strings, making the reader bleed for the main character. On the other hand, in order for the man’s faith to be “restored,” God has to explain himself.
Contrast Job. Job lost much more than the man in the story (ten children!), and it was due to the prince of demons being opposed to him, not a mere man, even if Job didn’t know that. He lost all his possessions, and then finally his health. He had much more to complain about than the man in The Shack. He too wanted God to explain. He wanted to vindicate himself as well. But when God finally has His say, He tells Job that He does not have to come to the bar of human reason. Humans have to come to the bar of God. This is where C.S. Lewis comes in. In his brilliant essay entitled “God in the Dock,” he makes the point that the really important thing for autonomous man is that he is the judge, and that God is in the dock. The man may very well be a kindly judge and acquit God of wrong-doing, if God shows Himself up to the task of defending himself. But the really important thing is that man is the judge, and God is in the dock (on trial). Job shows us that the reverse is true. God is the judge, and man is in the dock.
Rationalism always results in God losing one of His attributes. If God is all-powerful and all-good, then how come evil exists? The Bible does not allow us to lessen the difficulty of this question by jettisoning one of these attributes. The reason the problem is so acute for the believer is that God is both all-benevolent and all-powerful.
Just to begin an answer (and not leave the readers hanging), God allows evil to exist for various reasons, but evil will not continue to last. God has dealt with the problem of evil on the cross and the empty tomb, and will finally eradicate the very presence of evil in this world in the future. No other religion, by the way, or atheism, has an answer to this question. Pantheism believes that evil is naturally part of the world. No hope of eradication there. Atheism cannot define right and wrong, so his faith in his own reason becomes shockingly apparent when he confidently talks about the problem of evil. Deists don’t believe that God has anything to do with the world. These all lack hope and eschatology.
Bunyan and Young go in fundamentally different directions. Christian’s journey is to the bar of judgment as a defendant whom God will acquit based on the spotless righteousness of Christ imputed to him. The man’s journey in The Shack is to the bench, where he magnanimously acquits God of wrong-doing, once it becomes evident that God is really powerless to stop it. Of course, if God is powerless to stop evil, then He is also powerless to eradicate evil, and so that road is also a dead end eschatologically speaking.
In talking with one of my friends, he made the very interesting point also about faith. What moves Christian? It is the scroll, the evangelist, the Interpreter, the fellow believers he meets on the way, the key of faith in Doubting Castle. It is the means of grace which compels Christian to a life of faith. In The Shack, it is a one-time rationalistic showdown where God pleads and begs with the man (in effect) not only to give Him a hearing, but to acquit Him of wrong-doing. Ultimately, the man’s faith is in himself.
My friend also noted the contrast between the way in which God is portrayed in the Bible as opposed to how God is portrayed in The Shack. The God of The Shack is hardly a God with the least little hint of awe and majesty. He is not the God of the whirlwind, which is how God treated Job. He is not the God before whom all bow their faces to the ground. Instead, He is a God whose booty sways to the music. Anyone who cannot see the blasphemy and rank heresy of this portrayal of God is seriously lacking in discernment. God is Spirit, and only the Second Person of the Trinity has a human body which exists only in hypostatic union with the divine nature, and is currently a glorified body. I choose to believe the God of the Bible, who will eradicate evil because He is completely omnipotent and completely free of sin.
Vigorous, Provocative Writing
September 3, 2008 at 11:16 am (Books (reviews and recommendations), Culture)
My professor of Reformation church history at WTS (and I also took the valuable class on John Owen’s theology from him) has written two volumes that examine contemporary issues from a Reformed perspective (here and here). The writing is punchy, witty, and refreshingly opinionated, in contrast to the drool that drips from the pens of contemporary witless pseudo-scholars who think they have to be polite in order to be heard and respected. Now, make no mistake, Carl Trueman knows what politeness is, and he is polite when it is appropriate. However, when it comes to a position with which he disagrees, the boxing gloves go on, and you will almost always see the demise of the opposition’s position.
But one should be careful to interpret such boxing in its historical context: he is a Brit, an Englishman, to be more precise. Anyone who has any idea of what Parliament does over there will then have a good idea of what Carl is trying to do. Our overly polite society does not think, and this is one of Carl’s biggest targets. The other qualifying factor in reading Carl’s boxing matches is that Carl never takes himself too seriously. In fact, he is self-aware enough not to take himself any more seriously than he takes his opponents’ positions.
What Carl hates more than almost anything else is indifference. So Carl has insured that no one can read him with indifference. There might be an exaggeration here or there just for this purpose of avoiding indifferent readers, but it is all in good fun. Not only will you be entertained (isn’t that a necessity in modern culture?), but you will be forced to think. Don’t read these books if you are tired.
Of all the shorter pieces on various subjects, I would have to say that my favorites were “Boring Ourselves to Life,” “What Can Miserable Christians Sing?” “The Age of Apathy,” and “A Dangerous Gift for my Wife.” Of the longer pieces, I appreciated the inaugural lecture (which I had already read in WTJ) “Rage, Rage Against the Dying of the Light,” and his piece on the Finnish interpretation of Luther (which I had also read in WTJ previously).
Scriptural Basis for the PCA BCO on Deacons
June 22, 2008 at 12:41 am (Acts, Church, Culture, Inerrancy, Reformed, Timothy, Women)
Posted by Bob Mattes
I posted on the 36th General Assembly proceedings on deaconesses here without duplicating Lanes or TE Aquila’s posts on the subject. My initial thoughts on the issue of female deacons/deaconesses can be found here on GreenBaggins. I wanted to comment in this post on an item in both Overture 9 and the Overtures Committee minority report.
The operant phrase in Philadelphia Presbytery’s Overture 9 reads:
Scriptural teaching bearing on women’s eligibility for election and ordination to the office of deacon and recommending, if necessary, changes to the BCO in keeping with any findings proceeding from the study of Scripture;
And in the minority report from the overtures committee concerning Overture 9:
Is the Book of Church Order more, or less, restrictive than the Scriptural teaching bearing on the role of women in the diaconal ministries?
I thought that I’d help answer these questions by showing the direct connection between the BCO and the applicable Scriptures. Perhaps that will help some folks who think that they need a study committee to look at a handful of verses that we can all read for ourselves.
First, there’s a direct connection between 1 Tim 3:12 (all citations ESV):
Let deacons each be the husband of one wife, managing their children and their own households well. [my emphasis]
and Acts 6:3:
Therefore, brothers, pick out from among you seven men of good repute, full of the Spirit and of wisdom, whom we will appoint to this duty. [my emphasis]
And BCO 7-2:
7-2. The ordinary and perpetual classes of office in the Church are elders
and deacons. Within the class of elder are the two orders of teaching elders and ruling elders. The elders jointly have the government and spiritual oversight of the Church, including teaching. Only those elders who are specially gifted, called and trained by God to preach may serve as teaching elders. The office of deacon is not one of rule, but rather of service both to the physical and spiritual needs of the people. In accord with Scripture, these offices are open to men only. [my emphasis]
BCO 9-3:
9-3. To the office of deacon, which is spiritual in nature, shall be chosen men of spiritual character, honest repute, exemplary lives, brotherly spirit, warm sympathies, and sound judgment. [my emphasis]
and BCO 24-1:
24-1. Every church shall elect persons to the offices of ruling elder and
deacon in the following manner: At such times as determined by the Session, communicant members of the congregation may submit names to the Session, keeping in mind that each prospective officer should be an active male member who meets the qualifications set forth in 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1. [my emphasis]
Here you can see that Scripture commands deacons to be men only, and this guidance is followed exactly in the BCO. Nothing more or less.
Further, both the Scriptures and the BCO cover the issue of providing outside help to the diaconate. We find 1 Tim 5:3-16:
3 Honor widows who are truly widows. 4 But if a widow has children or grandchildren, let them first learn to show godliness to their own household and to make some return to their parents, for this is pleasing in the sight of God. 5 She who is truly a widow, left all alone, has set her hope on God and continues in supplications and prayers night and day, 6 but she who is self-indulgent is dead even while she lives. 7 Command these things as well, so that they may be without reproach. 8 But if anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.
9 Let a widow be enrolled if she is not less than sixty years of age, having been the wife of one husband, 10 and having a reputation for good works: if she has brought up children, has shown hospitality, has washed the feet of the saints, has cared for the afflicted, and has devoted herself to every good work. 11 But refuse to enroll younger widows, for when their passions draw them away from Christ, they desire to marry 12 and so incur condemnation for having abandoned their former faith. 13 Besides that, they learn to be idlers, going about from house to house, and not only idlers, but also gossips and busybodies, saying what they should not. 14 So I would have younger widows marry, bear children, manage their households, give the adversary no occasion for slander. 15 For some have already strayed after Satan. 16 If any believing woman has relatives who are widows, let her care for them. Let the church not be burdened, so that it may care for those who are really widows.
corresponding nicely to BCO 9-7:
9-7. It is often expedient that the Session of a church should select and
appoint godly men and women of the congregation to assist the deacons in caring for the sick, the widows, the orphans, the prisoners, and others who may be in any distress or need.
No disconnects, just unity of thought and approach between Scripture and the BCO. So what about Phoebe and Rom 16:1?
I commend to you our sister Phoebe, a servant of the church at Cenchreae,
The word for “servant” in that verse is ‘διακονον’ in the Greek. I cover this in some detail in this post, so will not duplicate all that here. Bottom line is that as far back as the Geneva Bible in 1560, Phoebe has been called a servant in accordance with good translating practice and the context of the verse. I will post a fairly comprehensive word study on the word ‘διάκονον’ and its close relatives in both the Greek New Testament as well as the LXX in the next few days. To get a sense for Paul’s usage in the meantime, look at Romans 15:8 and tell me if Christ is called a deacon:
For I tell you that Christ became a servant to the circumcised to show God’s truthfulness, in order to confirm the promises given to the patriarchs,
or 2 Cor 3:6 if we all are:
who has made us competent to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.
Or the well-known Matt 20:26 for Christ’s usage of the word:
It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant,
Are we all to become deacons? Of course not. I picked these particular uses of the word because they are very similar to the context in Romans 16:1. There’s no real case to be made here for female office holders.
Yet, some still disagree and think that Phoebe may have been a deaconess in the office-holding sense. Though I and other complementarians disagree with such a mistranslation, let’s assume for a moment, just for the sake of argument, that the details of this verse are unclear. Making Phoebe a deaconess here would make Paul inconsistent in his teaching on the role of women in the church. It certainly wouldn’t square with very clear verses like 1 Tim 3:12, 1 Tim 2:12, and 1 Cor 11:1-24 just to name a few. Roll Luke’s Acts 6:3 in as well. According to the analogy of faith, if one verse or passage isn’t clear, then we turn to others that are clear. Those standing on Rom 16:1 in hopes of finding deaconesses would do well to consider this basic Reformed principle and seek clarity from Scripture rather than the feminist culture.
None of this is rocket science. The majority report of the Overtures Committee cited these portions of the BCO. For those that want a Scriptural warrant, I have cited several clear Scriptural teachings in this and my previous post.
I’ll repeat here something that I posted on my blog earlier tonight. If we treat Scripture like a wax nose to accommodate the culture, we fall for the same lie that Eve swallowed in the garden: “Did God really say…” This deaconess thing is a Scripture authority issue, pure and simple. 1 Tim 3:12 by itself should be clear enough to settle this issue for those that hold to Scripture’s absolute authority. If we decide to try to conform Scripture to the world for whatever reason, we trade the gospel for a lie.
Posted by Bob Mattes
Christ and Culture
May 26, 2008 at 11:53 am (Culture, OT-Daniel)
5/25/2008
Once upon a time, there was a man named John, who worked for a building company. They made those massive I-beams that support bridges. He was a very important man, because he signed off after the inspection of these I-beams, so that they could be sent to the construction companies that needed them. If he didn’t sign the papers, then the building company could not sell the I-beams to the construction company. One time, there was an especially large shipment of I-beams about to go out, and John discovered an inherent weakness in the manufacture of this shipment. So, he refused to sign the papers. He was a Christian. The building company came to him and looked at the cost-benefit num-bers of the analysis, and came to the decision that these I-beams would have to be approved, or the company would lose money. So they told John to sign the papers. John refused. Then the board of the company got involved and said to John that if he still refused to sign the papers, he would lose his job. It was the only job he had, and the money was sorely needed by him. What should he do? What would you do? I’m sure that something of the same dilemma faced Daniel and his three friends Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, as they were exiled away from their home, and sent off to Babylon. In many ways, their situation is similar to ours, for we are Christians, and members of a heavenly kingdom, ad are currently exiled away from where our citizenship is. How do we relate to the world? How do we relate to the pressures of culture? What do we do when the world tells us that we must look and behave a certain way, or else face the consequences? And what motivates us to do the things we ought to do in such a situation?
The historical situation is this: Nebuchadnezzar had just finished his siege of Jerusalem and taken Jehoiakim captive, along with the religious booty of the instruments of the Lord’s temple. This is not a small thing, since what Nebuchadnezzar was saying as he put those instruments in the house of his god was that his gods had conquered the God of Israel. He had won, and so had his god. So, a very real question for the Jews was this: had God been defeated? Had God been unfaithful? The answer is in the first part of verse 2. Nebuchadnezzar had a different idea of what had happened than Daniel himself had. Daniel’s evaluation of the exile was that the Lord had given Jehoiakim into the hand of Nebuchad-nezzar. The Lord was faithful indeed! But He was faithful in judging the people of God for abandoning their trust in God for trust in Egypt, or Assyria, or their own military might, or whatever else they want-ed to trust. As they abandoned God, God gave them over to their enemies. God is faithful!
Nebuchadnezzar was wise in the ways of the world. He knew that the best way to rule Judea was to brainwash the best and brightest of their young people, so that Babylonian ways, and language, and thought patterns would be characteristic of Jewish people. So, he found four of the best and bright-est of all the Jews, and had them educated (or could we say brain-washed?) in Babylonian language and literature. Furthermore, he wanted them to forget about their powerless God (hadn’t he defeated their God), so he changed their names. The names of the four friends originally had something to say about God. Daniel’s name means “God is my judge.” Hananiah means “The Lord is gracious.” Mishael means “Who is like God?” and Azariah means “the Lord has helped.” Instead, Nebuchadnezzar gave them Babylonian names. Belteshazzar means “may Bel protect him” (Bel is the name of one of the Babylonian gods). Shadrach means “the command of Aku” (another god). Meshach means “Who is like Aku?” And Abednego means “servant of Nebo” (yet another god). Lastly, and most importantly, he wanted to switch their allegiance from their homeland and their own God over to him. That is the significance of eating from the king’s table. The issue is not unclean food, since wine is not unclean, according to the Old Testament. Rather, in eating the king’s food, they would be admitting that they were dependent on the king, and they would be acknowledging that the king gave them all blessing and honor. That would defile Daniel, since it would be idolatry. It would be putting money and position over God, much like John was tempted to do, in our story about the I-beams. Nevertheless, the temp-tation would be quite strong. It would be easy to rationalize the decision, too, since Daniel could have thought to himself, “Well, I am only outwardly eating this food. I am not inwardly serving Nebuchad-nezzar as a god.” The problem with that kind of thinking is that the very eating of this food was an acknowledgment of Nebuchadnezzar as god, whether one intended this or not. So Daniel resolved not to eat of this food. It is very instructive to notice here that Daniel’s resolve in this comparatively small issue is foundational for Daniel to be able to resist temptation in the future. I’m sure that many of us have noticed that if we fall to temptation, it is much easier to fall into temptation again. Fortunately for us, the reverse is also true: if we resist temptation, it can become easier to resist temptation more.
Notice also Daniel’s tact. He didn’t want to trumpet the fact that he was rejecting this ultimate allegiance. He did not intentionally seek to be martyred. He did not intentionally seek to be weird. He intentionally sought to be faithful to his God. So he proposes this test to eat only vegetables, which would not be part of the richness of the king’s table. Vegetables by themselves would not normally be the thing that would be expected to make someone look better. The official does not like the plan, since his own head will be on the chopping block if the experiment fails.
The fact that Daniel and his friends do look better after ten days is proof that the Lord stepped in and worked miraculously to honor Daniel’s commitment to Himself. Remember our friend, John? Well, he decided not to sign the papers, and the company fired him for it. However, that is not the end of the story. As a result of his not signing the papers, the I-beams were not delivered to the construction company on time. The construction company investigated the reason for that. When they found out that John had protected their interests even at the cost of his own job, they hired him on the spot, and with a pay increase. Daniel and his friends not only looked better than the other young men their own age, but the Lord gave them high positions in Nebuchadnezzar’s cabinet. The Lord exalts those who worship Him, but those who do not worship the Lord, the Lord humbles. This we will see in the later story of Nebuchadnezzar.
In the meantime, let us remember that our Lord went through something very similar to Daniel. It is called temptation. Satan tempted Jesus to conform to the world’s way of doing things. It is only a small thing, Satan would say. But Christ would not yield to temptation. Eventually, Satan saw to it that Jesus was killed for that, a sort of revenge. Satan thought that he had conquered Jesus, just as Nebu-chadnezzar thought he had conquered not only Judah, but also Judah’s God. However, just as God handed Israel over to Nebuchadnezzar, so also did the Father hand over Jesus to death. Peter tells us this in Acts 2, where he says that Jesus was handed over to death “according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God.” It was God’s plan all along! Thus did Satan find out that he had been tricked. On Easter Sunday morning, when the tomb was empty, only then did Satan realize that he had been beaten, rather than conquering Jesus himself.
So, if something is trying to undermine our allegiance to our King, we must resist. If someone tells us that we should overlook one of the Ten Commandments, because it is not practical, we should resist. If someone tells us to be dishonest, then we must resist. If someone tells us that holiness doesn’t pay, and that it is old-fashioned, and useless, we must not listen.
Our relationship to culture is not one of withdrawal. Daniel and his friends learned the Baby-lonian language and literature. That wasn’t a problem. Our relationship to culture is also not one of assimilation. This is our great problem in the church today: the church looks just like the world. We dress the same, act the same, divorce the same, steal the same, and in every other way, there is hardly a dime’s difference between the church and the world. Rather, we are to be salt and light, in the world but not of the world.
In order to do this, we must remind ourselves of our home. We must remind ourselves of heaven. And we must do that constantly. We must sing the songs of Zion, even if we are exiled current-ly from our homeland. North Dakota is not really our homeland. Heaven is our home. Our name is Christian. Remember that God is sovereign. The world may think that they have the church on the run. But God will show the true nature of things at the Final Judgment, and even though it may be difficult for us to see this now, rest assured that God will overturn the world, and that God is sovereign.
Empty Words and Peer Pressure
March 5, 2008 at 10:21 pm (Culture, Ephesians)
An old fable that has been passed down for generations tells about an elderly man who was traveling with a boy and a donkey. As they walked through a village, the man was leading the donkey and the boy was walking behind. The townspeople said the old man was a fool for not riding, so to please them he climbed up on the animal’s back. When they came to the next village, the people said the old man was cruel to let the child walk while he enjoyed the ride. So, to please them, he got off and set the boy on the animal’s back and continued on his way. In the third village, people accused the child of being lazy for making the old man walk, and the suggestion was made that they both ride. So the man climbed on and they set off again. In the fourth village, the townspeople were indignant at the cruelty to the donkey because he was made to carry two people. The frustrated man was last seen carrying the donkey down the road.
This story illustrates Paul’s point exceptionally well, since it illustrates both points that Paul is making in these verses. First of all, it illustrates the emptiness of the villagers’ comments. Any one of these arrangements is a perfectly acceptable way of traveling down the road, and yet the villages all passed judgment on whatever was the current arrangement. The villages did this more to make themselves look good than for any genuine concern about the old man, the youth, or the donkey. In other words, the villages were all giving out many empty words. Those words deceived the old man into thinking that his current setup was wrong and cruel. The second point that Paul makes here is in verse 7. Associating with such people means that peer pressure will be immense. The villages all implied that if you wanted their approval, then you had to do what they said. As a result, the old man was implicated as an accomplice in the empty words of the villagers. He was responsible for his actions, since he listened to their empty words. Let’s take these points one at a time.
Firstly, we must not be deceived by empty words. There are millions of people out there spewing out completely empty words, words that have no meaning, or worse: words that are deceptive, and intended to lead people astray. The health and wealth gospel as espoused by Joel Osteen is a premier example of this. He says that people need to live in utter victory now, and that anyone who is dealing with difficult circumstances in life now is not living in utter victory. In other words, if you don’t have a completely successful life now, then you are not a Christian. These are empty words. Jesus says that we need to take up our cross and follow Him. Victory is not until the next life. As Churchill says, we are only promised blood, sweat, toil, and tears.
Another example of empty words are the various attempts to derail the Gospel. Liberation theology says that the Gospel consists entirely of allowing black people their full voice in society, and that the Gospel is social liberation. The Gospel is liberation. However, it is liberation from sin. This liberation does have social consequences. But let us not confuse the consequences for the real thing. Feminist agendas see Christianity as inherently sexist, trying to put women down. So, they will either deny the authority of Scripture, saying that it is too hateful of women to be of use, or they will twist Scripture’s words to mean what they do not mean. These are empty words. Gay/Lesbian groups are not sitting idle with the Word of God, either. They are reinterpreting passages of the Bible that clearly speak out against the sin of homosexuality, and make them refer only to uncommitted relationships. The implication is that a committed homosexual relationship is fine. Again, empty words that deprive the Gospel of all its meaning.
Maybe the most insidious attack on the Christian faith today is postmodernism. This philosophy simply says that there is no such thing as an absolute truth. Furthermore, everyone makes up their own truth in life. Colleges everywhere are taking up this philosophy. The end result is that everyone’s religion is true. It doesn’t matter what you believe, as long as you believe it sincerely. If you have sons or daughters in college, then you really need to pay attention to this one, since colleges that are calling themselves Christian have espoused this philosophy. This philosophy is also empty and devoid of meaning. What does it mean to say that there is no such thing as a truth that is true for everyone? Is that statement supposed to be true for everyone? Is it true for everyone that there is no such thing as absolute truth? In other words, is it an absolute truth that there is no absolute truth? I hope you can see the utter absurdity of such thinking. Any and all such thinking is foolishness. We ought to avoid such thinking wherever possible. Otherwise, we will be tossed here and there with every wind of doctrine, much like the old man, who couldn’t please anyone, and so wound up in the completely absurd position of carrying his own donkey, which was supposed to be carrying him! But that is the result of being deceived by empty words: your life will be a contradiction.
In verse 7, Paul tells us not to associate with such people. Obviously, the best way to avoid being deceived by empty words is to avoid the empty words entirely! Notice that Paul said that the wrath of God is coming upon those people who are uttering these empty words. We are accountable for every word that comes out of our mouths. If the wrath of God is coming upon them (i.e., if the second coming will show up such people for who they are), then we should definitely not associate with them. After all, we do not want to be implicated in their guilt. That is really what this word “associate” means. It does not mean that we completely avoid talking to such people, or showing them Christ’s love. It means that we do not share in their ideas. In other words, we do not become accomplices to the crime of empty words. We do not become fellow participants in their empty words of deceit. How would such a thing happen? Well, if you do not have discernment, then you will not know whether someone’s words are empty or not. Therefore, you must develop spiritual discernment. How does one do that? Well, it happens primarily by the use of the means of grace. I harp on the means of grace, because most Christians today think that they just get zapped somehow, and they have spiritual discernment. It doesn’t work like that. Spiritual discernment takes a great deal of effort. It takes priority in your life. You may not be able to work that sixth job, if it means that you have no time for reading God’s Word, and being in prayer, and visiting other people in the body of Christ. Beware of having worldly priorities. Having worldly priorities means that the means of grace will be blunted in your life. They will not have the proper effect on your life, because you are too busy doing other things, and you see the means of grace as optional extras. They are not optional, and they are not extra.
Peer pressure, however, can also put a damper on the means of grace. Oftentimes, people who make use of the means of grace are labeled Puritans, goody two-shoes, or even worse, hypocrite. It is vitally important here to remember that we must obey God rather than men. Jesus did not die on the cross so that we could become accomplices in the crimes of others by bowing to their wishes in life. Christ died to create a new church, a new community that is built on the means of grace. Our association is with other believers. Our citizenship is in heaven. And we would do well to remember that. Who are the friends with whom you spend the most time? Are they unbelievers or believers? You should spend more time with believers. They should be your best friends.
The words of Christ are the words of life. They are the words of the Bible. There is no deceit in them. They are not empty, but full of meaning, richness, comfort, salvation, and life itself. Whose word will you trust? The empty words of our modern culture, which seek to advertise falsely? Or will you believe the words of eternal truth? If you will believe the words of eternal truth, then you must also associate with others who believe the same thing. Then your foundation will be built on a solid rock, which is Jesus Christ.
Avoid the Bots
November 24, 2007 at 10:08 pm (Culture, Internet)
Sounds like a SciFi movie, eh? Alien mechanical menaces sporting incredible strength and intelligence, vulnerable only to precision air strikes by the world’s greatest Air Force (OK, that last part was a shameless plug).
I wish. Bots and Spiders, far from being from space, are software search/crawling routines that wander the Internet. The good ones cull sites for linking through search engines like Google, Yahoo, etc. That helps everyone.
Evil bots and spiders sold their souls to serve the spammers from Gehenna. They primarily seek email addresses on web sites, then feed them into the great spamming databases in the place of eternal junk email torment. The vile spammers then suck the life blood from your bandwidth and time by offering all kinds of, uh, personal enhancements and dream dates.
So why do you care? Everyone should avoid openly posting email addresses on blogs and websites in a usable form, i.e., as a link. If you want to pass your email address to someone, use a non-link with separators like deathbots_at_gehenna_dot_com or without the separators like “nastyspider at thepit dot com”. There are lots of other variations that will protect your email address, so be creative. Remember, though, that your intended recipient must be able to decode your clever encoding. For your own protection, just don’t post a usable link.
You’ve been warned. The bots are out there lurking, searching, never sleeping, ever culling. Do your part–don’t feed them, especially after midnight.
Posted by the ever helpful Bob Mattes, who always has your best interest at heart. Trust him. Even with your credit card. Please.
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