Commentary on "Garden of Love" by William Blake

Garden of Love by William Blake

I need to disagree with most commentators on this poem. Certainly, this poem is about how the church opposes the "natural" state of "love" (at least, sexual love); yet I believe that Blake, like most romantic poets, was almost totally wrong.

First, they put up the bogeyman called "the church" and attack it, yet the church is not original here. Rather, it's the Bible that clearly supports some forms of sexual love and says "thou shalt not" about others.

But the more basic problem is that they assume, without argument, that the current natural state of sexual love is good and that the church (following the Bible) is wrong in stating "thou shalt not." This is far from obvious to me. There's no rational way of proving it. And, regarding our actual experience with life, a simple look at what is now the "natural" state of sexual love indicates this is not so: all the murders and infidelities and treacheries that have been committed in the name of "natural" sexual love, the hundreds of extant venereal diseases.

Blake is right on one point: in the "garden" (assuming he was referring to Eden), natural love was good; but we are clearly not in that garden any more. It's not "the church" that bars us from re-entering: it's your sin and mine. And that's not a simple problem that is easily solved by writing emotional panegyrics on the goodness of unbridled sexual love: it's a problem that's only solved by the ultimate sacrifice, the sacrifice made by Christ on the cross.

In summary, by all means read and analyze the poetry of Blake: but if you want to get to the truth of the matter, I urge you to throw off the easy emotional answers chosen by Blake and look for deeper rational answers. Perhaps you'll find the church (and neither Blake's caricatures of it, nor your own emotions) was really right in the first place.

Thoughts on making disciples

My friend Dennis Elenburg asked how we are fulfilling the great commandment to go out and make disciples. I said with my family, preaching at the retirement home, and leading worship at my kids' middle school. He then asked me three followup questions, which I will attempt to answer here.

(1) How do I make disciples within my own family: Well, one thing is that I am trying to teach the kids good theology. Nobody (believer or unbeliever) has no theology, just right theology or wrong theology. And theology is something that I think is also neglected in many churches today. We can't even come to faith in Christ without a somewhat right theology - to believe that we are sinners, that God is holy, hates sin, and only Christ can save us. So, with my son (and daughter to the extent she can understand, which will grow as she gets older of course) I have him read books that teach good theology - such as the absolute sovereignty of God in every area, including salvation - and we talk about the subject, such as discussing fallacies and problems with other theologies. He needs to be able to think and understand these things for himself, which is part of being a Christian.

Another thing is to teach them through words and example that they are here to do the work God put them here to do. So, I had my son join us in the evangelism course we took, practiced together, etc. Also, I make it very clear that I expect him to volunteer his time to help people in the community, to shine the light of Christ for them. I told him he could do anything he wanted, but since I am already connected at the retirement home, suggested he start there. And he is. He's playing the music for my Sunday morning service and also at another lady's Wednesday Bible study, and is doing other volunteering over there. Last week he played cards with the residents for an hour or so.

(2) How do you know if someone is a "true disciple": Well, I'd say that it's impossible to know for sure. I do think that God gives us some level of discernment, but ultimately we won't really know. I think the best measurement may be how they react to the gospel and its preaching. For example, I know a person who seems to be a Christian, is very interested in church things. We got to talking about sin and how many churches don't seem to want to talk about it nowadays. This person said something along the lines of their church talking about it too much. That made my ears prick up. Can you ever really talk too much about sin, given that in any church there will likely be a number of people who desperately need to understand their own sinfulness and hear the gospel? Somebody else complained about their sermons always presenting the gospel (sin, repentance, the cross, salvation). Does any true Christian/disciple get tired of hearing that message? I certainly don't.

However, my point was not really that we can know whether somebody is a true disciple, but rather whether we really preach the gospel so that they can become true disciples. We can talk about doing good things for other people and learn how to have a better sex life all day long, but unless we understand sin, repentance, and the cross, we and they are never going to become true disciples.

(3) Have you seen any elderly folk come to faith in Christ at their advanced ages? Not yet that I know of. There was one gentleman who I think God was drawing to Himself - his level of interest was certainly increasing, based on the questions he peppered me with weekly - but he passed away a few weeks ago. I can only pray that he heard and heeded the truth before he died. I figure if I'm faithful, if I'm there, God will draw those whom He wants. I may plant the seeds, water, or reap the fruits, but God gives the increase.

Four types of Christians to be or not to be

Every day (well, nearly every day anyway) I read My Utmost for His Highest. This is an awesome daily devotional, and I highly recommend it for every Christian. As I read the devotional for January 31st, I had a thought go through my mind. I got to thinking about this theme:

"Our calling is not primarily to be holy men and women, but to be proclaimers of the Gospel of God... Paul had not a hypersensitive interest in his own character. As long as our eyes are upon our own personal whiteness we shall never get near the reality of Redemption."

As I thought about it, I had to admit that there are indeed those who are more concerned about their personal holiness than about the salvation of others. I myself have been subject to this temptation from time to time in my walk as a Christian. However, as I reflected further, this is far from the only (or perhaps even biggest) problem in the church today.

So much ink (and so many electrons) have been spilled in condemning those who, like Chambers's targets, are more concerned about their own self-righteousness than the salvation of their neighbors. We should certainly strive not to be like this. However, that made me think about two other kinds of Christians that we should strive not to be like, and the kind that we should.

The first kind we should strive not to be is the polar opposite (who we'll call the "emergents"), those who say they are concerned about the salvation of others at the expense of their own personal righteousness. These blind guides, which I have elsewhere called "Cursing Christians," are lauded by Dallas Willard and in books like "Blue Like Jazz." They seem to believe that only by forsaking personal righteousness, by (misapplying Paul) being like all the sinful things done by all people, they are somehow making the Gospel more acceptable to them. I have at least two problems with these emergents. First, the absolute best I can say about these people (as a fairly recently reformed sinner myself) is that this is totally naïve. If somebody had come up to me cursing up a blue streak and then attempted to tell me about the love of Jesus, I would have laughed in his face. I would have said "oh yeah, you talk a good game, but when it comes down to it you are just as bad as I am." It was men who didn't judge me but still showed me great personal holiness who made me consider Christianity and the love of God, not men who made me feel comfortable in my sin. And second, anybody who thinks that once God saves us from our sins He is totally content with leaving us wallowing in their presence (that He takes away the penalty but does not expect us to change our voluntary indulgence in them) has not read the Bible very carefully. When God saves us, it's for a purpose, and that purpose should include personal holiness.

The second kind of person we should try to avoid being are those who change the "Gospel of God" to make it supposedly more palatable to non-Christians (these we'll call "the seeker sensitives"). The SS's do (in my experience) exhibit personal holiness, but present only part of the true Gospel of God. I heard a church service awhile back where the speaker steadfastly refused to call a sin a sin; any bad things the hearer may have done were passed off as mistakes, as "dumb stuff." This kind of presentation of the Gospel does not convict anybody of sin, and if anything is abundantly clear in the Bible as regards soteriology, it should be that true repentance is needed to be saved.

Given a total of three types of Christians we should not be, what kind should we be? First, God wants us to be very concerned about the salvation of others. But let's not imagine that God is like us, that He can only do one thing at a time ("ok, he's witnessing to somebody now; I can't manage to make him holy too, so I guess that'll have to slide"). No, if God wants us to share the Gospel with people, He can figure out a way to do it while we're exhibiting personal holiness. And second, if God wants to save somebody (since all Christians should agree it's God who saves), He will do it through a full presentation of the Gospel; He doesn't need some watered-down, "user-friendly" Gospel-lite to do it for Him.

I think it's obvious. God wants us to follow what we know is right as regards holiness, and present the full Gospel to people at the same time. As long as we strive not to be personally condemning but to preach the truth, God will use that to save some. For others - for what Christian can doubt there are multitudes who will not be saved, though it pains us? - the proclamation of the full Gospel will merely add to their wrath.

One of the most personally haunting things I can think of is a person who can honestly go to God and say "Sure, You sent Gary to me to preach the Gospel; but he never gave it to me." Heaven help me if I do not preach the full Gospel.

Hey, now I'm a "Bible Corrector" (part I)

[Note: Edited slightly to clarify the second bullet point]

What is it about the week after you get back from vacation? Not only do I have a pile of stuff to do at work, but in the same week I meet up with a couple of Mormon missionaries and now get into an discussion with a King James onlyist. My posting about the Mormon experience somehow brought on a flood - for me, anyway - of Mormon responders. My experience with the Mormons was positive. The responses were all kind; one responder in particular was extremely enlightening. I hope - although I don't expect - my interactions with responders to this posting will be as pleasant.

It all started when I somehow stumbled onto this video on youtube. I made a comment about 1 John 5:7. Little did I guess the floodgates that would open up. The person who put up the video has many well-entrenched - though poorly-informed - opinions on why the King James is the Only Bible that English speakers should use. The discussion (read it yourself) included such luminary points as:

• The KJV translators did not italicize 1 John 5:7, so it must be original.
• "The TR was the authorized body of text in Hebrew and Greek," so "ultimately, you are going to have that TR text translated into English for any English party to understand what was written in Greek, and Hebrew." (This point says a lot about the level of understanding we're dealing with here. If you are not familiar with the manuscripts, the TR only covers the Greek source of the New Testament, and contains no Hebrew. Besides, there are at least five different versions of the TR, as even KJV onlyist Peter Ruckman admits.)
  
• Any Bible version that does not have every verse in the KJV is guilty of a transgression of Revelation 22:19. (Never dealt with is the question of how we know that it's not the KJV translators themselves or compiler of the TR and various Byzantine manuscripts that preceeded it who transgressed Revelation 22:18b.)
  
• "Somewhere, to the English speaking public, which is the world language of commerce, God will have to come good on his expectations, and produce an authoritative book to hold his subjects to account in areas concerning Gods word." (A not totally unreasonable point, but not a reason why the KJV is it.)
• Every book in the Bible testifies of Christ. (This is true, but what does it have to do with the question of whether the KJV is the single authoritative Bible version for English speakers?)
• God apparently authorized the KJV as the first version in English. (Later, we discover that not only was the KJV not the first English version, it was not even the first authorized by an English king.)
• "The [verse] number system was imposed by God under the Old Testament [quotes Acts:13:33]... and then reinstated as a security tool by the King James translators." (Actually it wasn't: the Bible was long divided into chapters but not verses. And it wasn't the KJV that first did versification in English, it was the Geneva Bible, as this image from the 1581 Geneva Bible clearly shows.)
• "King James, was the ONLY English King, who AUTHORIZED the translation from the Hebrew and Greek into Shakespearean English during the time of the Renaissance. The scriptures correlated a profound connection to Kings relative to the inspiration, and preservation of Scriptures." (Actually, the Great Bible of Coverdale was authorized by both Henry VIII and Edward VI before the KJV. The KJV was commissioned by King James, as I understand it in response to philosophical objections against Calvinism.)
• "King Saul proceeded David. The first Adam failed, then second Adam did not.
  God hated Esau (the first born) but loved Jacob." (Apparently the argument is now being made that the first Bible version authorized by a king no longer is authoritative, but the second one.)

It should be fairly obvious from reading the exchange that he has his mind made up: the King James is the one and only authoritative Bible version for English speakers of all time. Any "facts" that can be brought in and marshalled to the defense of that belief are brought forward, regardless of truth. When required, they will be dropped or changed to support the main "fact" that the King James is the only authoritative version. It's like some defenders of evolution, who will accept no evidence that we might have been designed: if you ask how we know that evolution is true, they offer "well, we're here, aren't we? It must be true."

His parting shots to me are that I "don't have any faith, because you still have not offered us an infallible English document, and faith comes from the book brother" and that I am a "Bible corrector" because I refuse to continue this ridiculous argument with him. Actually, my faith is not in a man-made object, no matter how wonderful or majestic. My faith is in God Himself and His eternal word. The KJV is an excellent achievement (although many honest observers note that even at the time it was written, it was not the best or easiest to understand version). But it is man-made. Note that I do not say (I can feel the comments coming now) that Scripture itself is man-made. Every word of Scripture is God-breathed. But that does not mean every word in every language in every translation. If it did, then one would be forced to accept very poor translations (such as the new "inclusive ones" or the Jehovah's Witness "New World Translation").

In my second part, I would like to consider the reasons the King James onlyists respond as strongly and viscerally as they often do to questions about their preferred Bible version.

Witnessing to Mormon elders

I just got finished talking to a pair of Mormon elders coming to my front door. Honestly, I was tempted to not even talk to them: to quote 2 John 10, and ignore them. However, since I have been studying evangelism through Way of the Master and other sources, I decided to talk to them.

They were, as usual for Mormons, very nice young men. They were respectful, and seemed honestly appreciative that I knew a fair bit about the Bible. I also admitted to them that I had not made an extensive study of their religion. Besides, as I noted, even if I came up with a bunch of places where the Book of Mormon contradicted the Bible or where their prophets have issued false prophecies, they'd no doubt have a list of responses to each objection.

Rather, I tried to focus on two ideas. First off, that I had no particular reason to believe the Book of Mormon. When they brought up the fact that we needed help to understand the Bible and apply it to our lives, I agreed to a certain extent. However, I continued, I have many other good books by good, God-fearing men like John MacArthur and Charles Stanley - why should I listen to this Book of Mormon? They did not attempt to convince me of the supernatural source of the Book of Mormon - which is not supportable on objective grounds anyway - but rather said to look at the fruit. I then responded that it seems to me that these men have powerful ministries, helping thousands of people to become Christians or become strengthened in their faith and holiness. That's the kind of fruit I can believe in.

I then mentioned that, I simply cannot believe that there was no true church or religion on earth until Joseph Smith came along in the early 19th century to rediscover it. Jesus said that the gates of hell would not defeat His church, and I was being asked to believe that - at least for awhile - the gates of hell did in fact defeat the church. So they asked whether I thought that we needed continuing authority for functions like baptizing and prophesying. I responded no, that Scripture makes it very clear that Jesus Christ is the chief Cornerstone, that He built His church on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, who wrote the Bible.

They started talking about the "burning in the bosom" to authenticate the truths in the Book of Mormon, to which I said that I did not see any Biblical authority for this. They said that the Scriptures say that we should ask of God, who will lead us into truth. In response, I pointed out that it seems to me that God gave us many ways to "ask" of Him and be lead into truth - talking to Godly friends, reading the Bible, reading good books, etc. - and to their credit one of them agreed. He said he just meant that for some people the burning in the bosom applied, including for him.

The second idea I tried to focus on throughout the entire encounter is the basic truth of the Gospel: that every one of us is a sinner, and we are deserving of hell. When I spoke to them, I didn't realize that Mormons don't really believe in hell as a destination for any of us. I have since read about that and will bring it up in my next Mormon encounter. To that end, I led them through the Way of the Master "how many lies have you told in your life ... what does that make you?" stages. They admitted that they were liars and thieves and adulterers-at-heart, and said they needed Jesus to save them.

But it was a pretty easy admission. At one point they talked about God will give us faith after we make the effort to know Him and follow Him. That strikes me as the core of every man-made religion: that we make the effort first, and God saves us afterward. It seems to me it's at home just as much in Mormonism as it is in Arminianism or Catholicism. Now, I hasten to say: it's taken to a more logical extreme in Mormonism; that's why I would call Mormonism a heresy and the Mormon church a cult but not Arminian/Catholic ones. But that old desire to do it ourselves, to take some credit for our own salvation, is in every one of us. Only an honest reading of the Bible - and having our eyes opened by God - shows us that all our good deeds are truly like filthy rags.

It was quite a long conversation - and I have not done a very good job relating it all - and they wanted to follow up at a later date. Not wanting to enter a long-term discussion, I demurred, but ended by saying that I believe that we are not where we are by accident, that God appoints our times and places. I said I believed that God had brought them here for a purpose. And it was God's purpose that we examine ourselves, "make our election sure." The one who seemed the more experienced agreed, and promised that he'd honestly ask God to show him the truth if I would do the same. I agreed. I have no problem with that. They also gave me a Book of Mormon and pointed out some passages to read.

I just pray that, in addition to God showing me more and more of His truth (which I truly do pray for!), that He opens up the eyes of these two precious young men to their own true state, to the own desperate wickedness, and their need for the Savior as He opened mine. And not the son of Jehovah god who had advanced, through eternal progression, into a state of godhood and of the celestial mother, not the spirit brother of Lucifer; but the one and only begotten Son of the only and living God, Jesus Christ.

Is the Calvinist God a cosmic rapist?

I have mentioned before that Yahoo! Answers is one of my personal mission fields. I go over there to defend the faith as best I can, to hear some new criticisms of Christianity from non-Christians (this does not happen very often), and generally to witness to people. I have met a number of interesting people over there, including atheists, Muslims, and Wiccans. I had the honor of speaking to a very intelligent and sensitive Wiccan in an extended email conversation a few months back. As a defense again my monergistic ideas of God's election and, indirectly, against the idea of any kind of sovereign God at all, she mentioned that Hank Hanegraaff said that the God of Calvinism would be equivalent to a cosmic rapist. I had never heard this ridiculous quote before, so I had to find whether he had really said this.

A little searching led to an article by Hank titled "Why Does God Allow Bad Things to Happen to Good People?", where he said:

Furthermore, without choice, love is meaningless. God is neither a cosmic rapist who forces His love on people nor a cosmic puppeteer who forces people to love Him. Instead, God, the personification of love, grants us freedom of choice. Without such freedom, we would be little more than preprogrammed robots.

I wish I could say that I was shocked by this, but sadly I am not. This is the kind of stuff that Hank comes out with too often today. This kind of thing can only have the effect of turning people off from the Biblical God to a god of their own making. It gives them one more arrow they can use to not to believe in the God of the Bible, a quiver which is tragically quite full already. In the case of the Wiccan above, it was another reason why she did not accept God's claims on her. And from her point of view it makes sense: why should she accept the claims of a cosmic rapist?

In addition, it shows an unfortunate lack of understanding of Calvinist theology which is common from people with less theological sophistication, but which I had hoped better for from Hank. Specifically, these comparisons are ludicrous for several reasons:

• What is a rapist? A person who does something against the person's will that will harm them. Even with any greater understanding of Calvinist theology, the comparison is terrible because God is doing something indescribably wonderful for the person.
• What is a puppeteer? A person who animates a dead body to give it the illusion of life. This one actually does have a bit of Biblical support: for what can a dead man do for himself? However, the Bible does not say God gives us the illusion of life. It says He gives us life, and that more abundantly, eternal life with Him ruling in the heavens. What's more, our fallen will is not neutral: it is actively fighting against God, hating Him.

No, God does not cosmically rape us. He, who created us to love Him, sees us in our pitiful fallen state and, despite the fact that we hate Him, made way for us to be reconciled to Him. None of us deserve to be saved, we all deserve the hell we desire. Due to our fallen will, nobody wants to be saved; the dog returns to its vomit. Better to rule in hell than serve in heaven.

However, God's justice would be a travesty if everybody were saved. Thus, God, with an intelligence and wisdom not only infinite but untainted by sin, wisely decides which of us to graciously save. I cannot imagine on what basis He makes that decision; but then I am not God. I can't figure out most things He does; His thoughts are not our thoughts. Because none of us wants to be saved, He must regenerate our wills, at which point we can accept His offer of salvation.

The Calvinist's God is not a Cosmic Rapist or puppeteer. The comparison is crass. Even if you're not a Calvinist, you must understand this. Hank, I expected better from you.

An interesting comment by Ray Comfort

I wanted to quickly note something that Ray Comfort said on the air a couple of weeks ago. I should start by noting that they are very non-committal when it comes to the subject of the basis of soteriology. Todd regularly skirts Calvinist/Arminian issues on his radio show. For their purposes, I think that is totally appropriate. It is far more important that people come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ than that they accept Biblical theology as a whole. Theology is important, but one can become a Christian even with a rather poor knowledge of theology. There's time for them to grow in their new faith, and God will see that they understand what they need to.

Besides, until recently, every preacher of the Gospel agreed that the word of God and the consequent convicting knowledge of sin and repentance is what saves people, not cool music and "relevant" videos and stories. This was as true for John Wesley as for Charles Spurgeon. I note that they have recently added the book "Wesley Gold" to their "Spurgeon Gold." That is a good thing: I'd hate for Arminians to reject the greatest tool to evangelize the lost simply because their theology does not allow them to listen.

Anyway, they were preparing to talk to a Muslim on the air. For those who have not heard the show much, there is quite a bit of "peanut gallery" conversation - back and forth, just for fun. So, during this period when the Muslim was coming on the line, Todd mentioned something about the five pillars of Islam. Ray then said:

"He wants five pillars? I'll give him five pillars: T-U-L-I-P."

Made my day. :-)