The Biblicist Cajoneador

String Theory and Theology

2011-12-06T02:15:00.004-05:00

A facebook friend turned me onto this video from Brian Greene, a string theory physicist. It's interesting. mind-blowing stuff. Brian Greene is obviously a smart guy. His understanding of physics is way beyond mine, no doubt about it. His ideas about string theory are very interesting and may turn out to be true. I kind of hope they are: it's very cool, and it explains a number of physical mysteries we still have. It may turn out to be true, or, if not, surely something more complicated will. However, I have two questions.

First, I understand why we should respect somebody like Brian Greene as a professional physicist; I don't understand why we should listen to him as an amateur theologian. He speaks elsewhere of his veganism, or his ideas that there must be a copy of you and me out there in the multiverse, because somewhere along the way there's an infinite number of collections of atoms just like us. But whence does he get the idea that we are merely the atoms we are made of? That's Greene the amateur metaphysician and theologian stating his philosophy of reductionist materialism, not Greene the professional physicist talking about the science he's spent years studying and teaching. I'd rather give credence on that subject to those who have been in touch with the Creator of this universe, the authors of the Bible.

And second, why do we think that string theory has anything to do with the truth explained by God in the Bible, "In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth" or its companion "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God"? String theory, if true, will turn out to be yet one more amazing demonstration of God's power and creative ability.

God is beyond any theory in physics, because He created the reality that physics attempts to describe. Now, I'm all for science (and have studied a lot of it over the years); but let's not let speculations about what COULD BE wipe out our innate knowledge of who we are and who God is. Science is a wonderful tool for understanding God's creation: I believe God gave us minds to understand the mysteries of His handiwork and give Him the praise He deserves. And, of course, nothing I could say says it better than this: "since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse."

We know we're sinful; we know we are accountable to a holy God for the sins we continue to commit every day. No amount of physics, no amount of speculations that distract our minds from what we know to be true, will overcome that. Have you, having been handed the map that shows you how to get to the correct destination, let yourself become so distracted by speculations of what kind of ink the map is printed with, that you disregard the actual directions written on the map? I love the map, I love to explore the details, and I praise the Mapmaker for them; but it seems to me that the wise man does not let himself be distracted by those things so much that they do not reach the proper destination.

Pondering Quantum Consciousness

2011-11-28T22:34:00.005-05:00

A facebook friend (an interesting person whom I don't actually know in real life) recently sent me a link to a movie called "What the Bleep do We Know." She told me that it showed there's a lot more to life than meets the eyes, and the ideas behind the film are supported by modern science. Well, as I obviously do believe there's more to life than meets the eyes, and I'm all for science, I thought I'd look into the movie. The first problem is that it makes its claims on the basis of quantum mechanics. Now, I was an engineering major in college, not a physics major. I did study quantum mechanics a bit, but it had been far too many years. So I undertook a refresher on QM.

Thus armed, I started watching "What the Bleep." (My impressions below are based on an imperfect understanding of QM; I would gladly be corrected on the science involved.) What I saw was interesting, but I very quickly ran into a difficulty. It turns out that all scientists agree on the fact of QM: that it works, that it represents reality in some way, that superposition is real, and so forth. What they do not agree upon is (as usual in science), the interpretation of those facts. There are, in fact, many interpretations of what QM really means. There is one common interpretation called the Copenhagen interpretation (named after the location of the laboratory of Neils Bohr, an early quantum researcher); it's difficult to tell, but it seems that the movie might follow this interpretation. But this is far from the only interpretation. Many quantum physicists follow the many-worlds interpretation, many-minds, etc., as discussed on the appropriate wikipedia page.

Compounding the problem of interpretation is that, from what I know, Copenhagen does not support their conclusions. It may be true that when we measure a quantum system, the wave function really does collapse as a result of this measurement in reality, and that's all there is to it. I read an article whose author was proposing the Copenhagen interpretation rules out the idea of the Christian God. This seems to be the viewpoint of the film's makers. However, I am not sure why this should be so. My understanding is that there's no agreement on what mechanism actually would cause the collapse proposed by Copenhagen. And unless we know what the mechanism is, how can we be sure that a "measurement" by God would trigger it? And do we even know that God would need to make such a measurement? Couldn't He know the quantum state of every particle in the universe, not because He measured them, but perhaps because He created them with something like entanglement with Himself? (As I said, I welcome correction by somebody who really knows quantum physics. This is purely a negative conjecture, by the way, not a statement that I think this is the reality. Like the movie makers, I really don't have the right - the quantum mechanical chops, so to speak - to opine on such things.)

So, despite that difficulty, I started watching the movie. One of the early examples given in the movie was a Native American tribe who saw Columbus' ships coming over the horizon but did not respond to them. According to the movie, since they were unfamiliar with the ships, they simply did not see the ships - that is, until a local shaman noticed a disturbance in the water and told them what they were seeing. First, even if the story were as described, this would not be an example of not seeing, it would be an example of not perceiving; there are many different reasons why they would not perceive the ships even if they actually were in plain sight. Second, the evidence (as noted in the wikipedia article above) seems to be that they did see the ships: they just ignored them because they didn't perceive imminent danger.

But let's use logic for a second. First, we don't have direct access to any of these Native Americans. Therefore, we can't know what they really saw or perceived: only through reports, primarily in their language, would we know. And their language may well have been insufficient to describe Spanish Galleons: they may have seen the ships but not known what to call them. But even more, let's use common sense. This tribe was living on the water. It may have been true that they had never seen a Spanish Galleon, but surely they had smaller boats. Surely somebody from that tribe would have discovered the useful fact that things can float on the water? And unless they were really ignorant they surely would have recognized the Galleons as just a larger and more complicated version of the boats they already had.

The next interesting bit in the movie was about superposition: the star (Marlee Matlin) walked up to a young man playing basketball, who explained to her the secret of quantum superposition using basketballs. Superposition is certainly true, and one of the many things that makes QM weird to our classical sensibilities. It is also true that, upon observation, the superposition collapses into a single particle with a specific position. Unfortunately, the way the movie presents it is not supported by QM. The movie implies that it's the observer who is choosing how the superposition collapses, but this is not true: it collapses probabilistically, and according to the Born Rule, the probability of observing the particle in any one place is proportional to the amplitude of the original wave. Therefore, when you make your observation, you get a single reading that is random based on the probabilities involved. If the superposition was very simple (such as s|A> + s|B>, where s=sqrt(1/2)), 50% of the time you'd get A and 50% of the time you'd get B. There is no concept in QM of choosing your own reality. The movie makes it look like the will of the conscious observer is what chooses the final state.

This is as far in the movie as I have gotten; I will write more as I watch more. But already it's become clear that the movie is an attempt to make its audience feel better about being independent of God. We all know that we are small, imperfect, sinful creatures; we all know there's much more to reality, not only than we can see, but than we have ever imagined. The question is, where do we take that knowledge? It seems to me that the makers of this movie use their knowledge of QM as an excuse to remove themselves from under God's hand; just use QM rightly and “you will be like God.” An example of this is the state-choosing representation of collapsing a particle in superposition state. If all your futures are just superpositions - including the future where you end up in heaven or hell - then, according to this teaching you can choose your own destination. Sadly, neither the Bible nor QM teaches this.

On the other hand, I am all the more in awe of God. He cannot be put into any classical box. Some day, no doubt QM will be shown to be incomplete; the history of science shows us this cycle repeatedly. I have no doubt that God will continue to be the God of the latest science every bit as much He is God of everything else.

Finally, I should note that it is true that you can choose your future; but not in the way the makers of this movie imply. If any one of us repents of our sins and turns to God through faith in Jesus, then we will have chosen our future. That's what John 3:16 says: God loved the world in this way, that He sent His only Son, so that every person who believes in Him would not perish, but have eternal life. That's the choice we must make, not choice of one superposition state or another; and I pray that every person reading this makes it.

Abusing Texts: 2 Peter 3 (part 2)

2011-07-24T21:33:00.005-04:00

In my last post, I talked about two misuses of 2 Peter 3:8-9; now, perhaps the most egregious misuse. I mean, of course, using it as "evidence" against particular redemption. First off, the theme of this passage is not individual salvation at all, but rather is a reassurance to believers regarding the end of the world and why God is delaying it. (This is why the Campingites actually have a better leg to stand on than most evangelicals; at least the passage is about judgment.) I mean, just read the passage. (The whole passage, not just verse 9.)

Verse 3 starts off as mentioning a specific group of people, the "scoffers." In fact, there are three groups involved here:

The addressees of the letter, who are believers. These are addressed directly in the second person ("you").
The scoffers, who are unbelievers, the "scoffers." They are addressed indirectly in the third person ("they").
The apostle, who might have addressed himself in the first person (as "I" or as part of "we" with "you")

As you read this passage, follow the pronouns. What is the apostle saying? He's saying that unbelievers will scoff at our belief in Christ, and that they do so, not because they cannot believe nor that their "felt needs" have not been addressed, but because their desires are evil. Belief in Christ has always interfered with our sinful desires: that's why people don't believe. "Where is this coming He promised?" You might as well be reading a modern atheist's blog.

The apostle goes on to give two reasons why we have not yet seen the second coming of Christ.

Because we do not understand God's time rightly. The apostle is speaking here of the Greek καιρός, not χρόνος. We want things to happen right now, on OUR appointed time scale. But just because a thing has not happened in the time frame when we think it should, doesn't mean that it hasn't happened in God's καιρός.
Because (flowing from the first) God has not seen fit to place all His elect into the time (χρόνος) we might think He should have. God's elect numbers more than the stars in the sky (Gen 15:5). We know that the end has not yet come because God has not yet gathered all His elect. It's sheer presumption to think that all of them should be gathered in by our particular lifetimes.

However, when the end does come, as verse 10 says, it will come quickly and without warning. When God has gathered in all His elect, it will come immediately; everybody will see.

Given that this is the flow of the passage, whence flows the maxim "God wants everybody to be saved?" The answer should be obvious: not from this passage at all. From where then? Clearly, from our traditions and emotions. It constantly amazes me that people who claim (like Dave Hunt) that they have no traditions are absolutely tradition-bound when "exegeting" passages like 2 Peter 3. They reach conclusions that have absolutely no basis in the text and simply state them; apparently, in their minds, the passage is so obvious that no exegesis is needed. Norm Geisler does a bit better, attempting to give a bit of exegesis on this passage to support his view that it disproves particular redemption. Unfortunately, his skimpy and rather apoplectic exegesis (found on page 249 of Chosen But Free, 3rd edition) demonstrates nothing more than his traditions overcoming his logic.

I have a few other thoughts about this passage, but I'll finish them up in a third installment.

Abusing Texts: 2 Peter 3 (part 1)

2011-07-04T14:10:00.002-04:00

What is the most abused passage in the Bible? Matthew 7:1? Leviticus 19:19? Probably both good candidates, but my vote is for 2 Peter 3 (especially verses 8-9). For one thing, the former two passages are usually abused by non-believers, whereas the last is usually abused by people who are (at least professing) Christians.

But more, 2 Peter 3 stands out as having been abused by so many different kinds of professing Christians! First, we have the old-earth creationists. There's evidence for and against old-earth creationism, and frankly I don't know which side of that debate I come down on. But surely 2 Peter 3:8 is not good support for any Christian? Its context has absolutely nothing to do with creation. As far as I know, until the mid-19th century nobody took this verse as support for an old earth. If it is support, then we'd have to admit a fatally flawed hermeneutical method, wrenching the verse out of context to make a point. This is called eisegesis, and I don't think we want to go there.

The second kind of Christian who have abused this passage is that group who recently had their day in the spotlight, followers of Harold Camping. Although their books provide many convincing (well, to "true believers" anyway) proofs of the October 21st end of the world, this verse is the foundation. Read for yourself in Camping's booklet "We are almost there". This understanding has a little better support than the first case of abuse (or frankly, than the third) since the passage is actually about judgment. But taking this as a mathematical formula, adding it to an assumed and arbitrary date of Noah's flood, and coming up with a date that conveniently falls with Camping's lifetime is a bit more than the text will bear, especially as the entire chapter of Matthew 24 militates against this as a possibility. (Note the tenor of the entire chapter fights it, not just 24:36, regardless of what Campingites would have us believe.)

But the third, and perhaps most egregious case of abuse against 2 Peter 3:8 is by traditional evangelical Christians. Everybody from Chuck Smith to Norm Geisler to Dave Hunt use this passage as one of their primary proof-texts against the doctrine of unconditional election. But surely this is a terrible case of eisegesis?

In my next note I will 'splain.

Guatemala 2010: Gary's Summary

2010-04-04T22:31:00.007-04:00

All I can say is Wow. What a week. I can't believe it's over. It went so quickly, and I am sitting here wishing that I was back in Guatemala - though this time I wish I had my whole family with me.

I was just sitting here thinking about all the things we did over the week. First of all, just a huge shout out to the Kendalls. Without them the whole would not have happened. Carol and Forrest have such a love for the people of Guatemala, and such a desire to do what God has called them to do. We stayed at their house, did the work they put together for us, and generally just enjoyed the time we spent with them.

Here are some of the highlights that I remember most clearly, some of which I've blogged about elsewhere, some not:

Four hard-working days in the water filter factory, building water filters for people who desperately need clean water.
Many visits to wonderful, loving families filled with people living in abject poverty, yet who were very friendly and loving to us. Multiple times, for example, at Oscar's house, his sisters thanked me for coming by their house and visiting them. As if a visit from me was any great shakes!
My wonderful little friend Sandra, whom I simply cannot get out of my mind.
Preaching at 2:00am to drunk partiers in the middle of the central parque of Antigua, and having one young man simply say in response to our gospel presentation "Peco" ("I sin" - as if the rest of us don't) and having a young lady look at me pleadingly and say "¿Qué puedo hacer?" ("What can I do?"). Most of the people were laughing at us, of course, but if you can reach even one person it's totally worth it.
Since it's fresh in my mind, the conversation I had with our cab driver to the airport in Guatemala City. After he told me that he worshipped God "en mi manera" ("in my own way") and declaring he didn't believe hell existed as a real place, I had the privilege of sharing the gospel with him for the remaining half hour of our cab ride. At the end, he thanked me and we parted pleasantly, me giving him a gospel tract which had thoughtfully been supplied by Carol that morning.
The fun restaurant we went to twice, La Peña de Sol Latino, featuring live music. (Their web site appears to be down right now.) One night they had excellent Peruvian music featuring the restaurant's owner (a gringo) on the conga drums.
The cultural events of Semana Santa, at once so beautiful and so tragic because so many people are putting their faith in objects of God's creation rather than the God who created them.
The warm, friendly people we met everywhere. Nowhere did we have people look at us and say (at least out loud) "stupid gringos". (We were not, of course, acting like stupid gringos, which no doubt helped greatly.)
All the people I gave tracts to. I can remember many of their faces and am praying for each of them. I remember especially well all the people working around La Merced cathedral. I walked up to each of them and said something along the lines of "Gracias por su servicio aquí ... Puedo ver que está interesado en cosas espirituales ... ¿puedo darle un regalito con más sobre Dios?" ("Thanks for your service here ... I can see you are interested in spiritual things ... can I give you a little gift with more about God?") I even - what can I say, I'm getting bold in my old age - approached several nuns and gave them tracts.
An excellent new book I found called Correct Your Spanish Blunders. In my opinion, this is the second-best book on fine-tuning your Spanish I have ever found (second only to Breaking Out of Beginner's Spanish). I will be ordering this from amazon tout de suite.

All in all, we spent several hours at church, probably 6-8 hours in evangelism, a few hours simply enjoying the culture, and the rest of the time in service to the people of Guatemala. I have very few regrets about my time there: perhaps my only real regret is not making more of an effort to talk to the Mormons that I saw several times in Antigua.

So ... where do we go from here? Honestly, I'm not 100% sure. One thing I know: I am praying that God never lets me be the same again. If you can go to a place like Guatemala and come out unchanged, there's something wrong with you. I am sincerely praying that God does not let me be like that.

One tentative thought I had: there are so many people with needs there that you cannot fix everybody's situation. However, you can help people you have a connection to. So, I will be pondering and praying over the next days and weeks how I might be able to help Sandra's and Oscar's families. One thought I had was that since education is the way out of poverty for hard-working people like Oscar's and Sandra's families, and it costs money to send kids to school, perhaps we could sponsor a few kids to go to school.

Ja will follow up with a final posting of his thoughts after this amazing trip. For now, God bless all, and I'm off to bed. Work tomorrow ... let's just say that I'm not looking forward to getting back to work. I am thankful that I have it, if for no other reason than I can make money to go on wonderful trips like Ja and I have just made.

Guatemala 2010: Street preaching

2010-04-03T06:26:00.010-04:00

Wow! What a 24 hours was Good Friday! It all started at 1:00 in the morning...

According to our schedule for Semana Santa, the celebrations started at 1:00 am and went all night long. So, we got to bed early to try and get a little sleep before going down there. I got about an hour and a half's sleep - unfortunately, Ja did not get any - before having to wake up to the alarm at the unholy hour of midnight. But, in for a penny, in for a pound: so down to La Merced we went for El Pregón de Sentencia, or the presentation of sentencing. The processions actually follow the Biblical time sequence fairly accurately, with Jesus going on trial in front of the Sanhedrin in the middle of the night and moving on to Pilate after daybreak. The Kendalls told us we really should go down there to see the beautiful alfombras, so off we trudged. The sentencing consisted of Roman soldiers in full Roman dress uniforms on horseback, along with a soldier announcing Jesus' sentence of death. Unfortunately, totally out of character for Guatemala, the Pregón actually took place ahead of schedule, so we missed it. What are the odds of that! Thankfully, like all processions, it moved from place to place, with the soldier repeating the sentence periodically; so we were able to see one of the later presentations.

Having missed the pregón itself, we decided to drop by the café of the church where we had attended on Sunday. Earlier on Thursday night, we had gone in there before attending church and had been told they'd be open all night and that a group of them might go out and do some street preaching. There, we met up with Mark, a fine Christian gentlemen with a great passion for reaching the lost who was indeed going out to preach. Yes, street preaching: that Rob Bell-lambasted "Bullhorn Guy" activity where you go out and preach the gospel to unsuspecting passersby. I have long said that Rob Bell has no idea what he is talking about; that every person I know who has come to faith as an adult that I've discussed the question with has been positively influenced by a street preacher somewhere along the line. I vividly remember seeing street preachers on the quad at George Mason University back in the late 80s; though I didn't come to Christ right then and there, I definitely remember them as somebody who I respected for their faith and zeal even though I did not (at the time) share their religious convictions.

Note to Rob Bell: open your ears to what us real adult converts have to say. Be thankful for your sheltered Christian-from-birth bubble, but don't just stay in there and assume you know how everybody else thinks. Some of us who come in from the outside just might know better what non-Christians like we were need to hear. (Not to mention the way the Bible presents the gospel.)

Anyway, though I had long been in favor of street preaching, I had never done it: in fact, it scared me to death. But when we heard that Mark was going to go and do it, we decided to join in with him. So, out went our little rag-tag group of four: Mark, our fearless leader; Dave, Mark's assistant and straight man; Ja, who speaks little Spanish but the rest of us could translate, and myself. Ja and I had never street preached, but we still felt fairly well equipped from the Way of the Master basic training course we had gone through. Now was our chance to use it. Yikes!

By the way, let me get in a plug for Way of the Master: I strongly believe that every Christian should watch these videos and put them into practice. If you are uncomfortable with sharing your faith with people, Christian, go to the link above right now and order the course. Or, if you want to go down to Guatemala and experience the training along with evangelism opportunities just like I'm describing here, Mark is holding an Evangelism Bootcamp June 20-26. This would be a great chance to get trained using excellent materials and get an awesome chance to practice in the same live environment where we were, for a very reasonable price. Maybe Mark will even take you out in the middle of the night. :-)

We spent the next three hours walking around the central park area of Antigua, sharing the gospel with whoever we met there. The Way of the Master method is quite simple: you essentially follow the first three chapters of Romans. You first present the bad news, then you present the Good News. That is, you present the law of God in the form of the ten commandments, and demonstrate that all your listeners have broken them. For example, Thou shalt not bear false witness. Have you ever told a lie? If so, what does that make you? The obvious answer is "a liar." The Bible says that all liars will have their part in the lake of fire. Next, Thou shalt not commit adultery. Have you ever looked a a member of the opposite (or same) sex not your spouse with lust? Jesus said that's the same as committing adultery in your heart; thus, that makes you an adulterer-at-heart. After presenting three or four commandments and have the listener admitting that he has broken all of them, you help them to understand that they do not deserve heaven, they deserve hell. Once they have that understanding, then (and only then) do you share the Good News: that Jesus Christ died to take the penalty that they deserve, and by putting our faith in Him and Him alone, we can be freed from the penalty that we all deserve. Straight out of Romans.

It might seem that it would not be a fruitful place to preach, as most people in the park at 1:00am were drunk, but it was. Though we didn't have anybody put their faith in Christ right then and there, there were definitely a number of people who were under strong conviction by the Holy Spirit. One young lady, after I had explained about the ten commandments and how breaking them meant she was headed for hell, looked at me with a blank look in her eye and asked "so what can I do?" At that point you have the privilege of explaining that putting your faith in Christ's sacrifice, not in your own works, is the way of salvation. It's such a freeing truth! And, I should note, one that friendship evangelism would most likely never have provoked.

We were actually interrupted one time by an intelligent but militant atheist heckler who wanted to argue about the injustice of God using regurgitated quotes from Christopher Hitchins as well as scatter-shot fired objections he seems to have actually thought of himself. Mark was preaching at the time, and his lack of facility in Spanish actually came in handy: the atheist switched to English and continued the argument while Dave and I talked to the crowd. Ja then came to our rescue and took the atheist aside and talked with him for awhile (I'm very proud of that boy) so Mark could return to talking to other members of the assembled crowd. It all turned out very well: you might even suspect that God had a hand in the whole thing. (Wink.)

After three hours of exhausting preaching we returned to the church café for a cup of coffee and cookie, and off to bed. (Ja, of course, had a sandwich. He earned it.)

The next afternoon, after sleeping in, we went out to the market to buy a few final souvenirs. As we were walking around the market, we happened to see a street preacher we didn't know walking through the market and evangelizing. After listening for a few minutes to convince myself that he was doing solid Biblical preaching (you can't be too careful), I struck up a conversation with him. We talked for a minute and then we both spontaneously started talking in raised voices. I found myself again preaching in Spanish to a rapidly assembling crowd right there in the middle of the market! I suspect the fact that we were a gringo together with a Guatemalteco that attracted people's attention, but so what? Once they started listening, they could hear our gospel presentation. Once again, we had a number of interested listeners. I handed out as many gospel presentation tracts as I had with me to our listeners. Ja did a double take and said "where did you get those from?!" as I had apparently produced them as if out of thin air. Thankfully, I had brought along a handful for just such an occasion: it always pays to be prepared. I could have given out two or three times as many as I had to the eager recipients.

So, we had an extremely exhilarating but exhausting 24 hours. There were a minimum of 8 people who I believe were genuinely under conviction by God's Holy Spirit. Since then, I have been praying for them. I would appreciate your prayers for them, too.

Before I close, let me make an aside to those readers who are not evangelical Christians. Most people in Guatemala are Catholics, but we were emphatically not out there to get people to change churches. Good evangelists never do that. If an evangelist is trying to get you to join his particular church, run away, and FAST. (Well, either that, or evangelize him, like I do with the Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses who show up at my door.) That's not what the Bible calls us to do. It calls us to introduce people to being in a relationship with Him, the living God of the universe, NOT to join a particular church. My primary desire is to see people come into a live-giving relationship with God; I trust that the same God who can save them will lead them to being in whatever church He wants them in. If God leads them to stay in their own current church, that's wonderful; if He leads them to leave, that's great too. I figure God can choose what church they should be in way better than I will ever be able to. Do I encourage them to join a solid church that teaches the Bible? Absolutely. But that doesn't mean that my church is the only place that does it.

Guatemala 2010: Experiencing Semana Santa

2010-04-02T18:21:00.010-04:00

As you can tell from all of our other posts, we are primarily down here to help build and install water filters. The water filter and other humanitarian efforts consumed almost every day. However, by a somewhat unfortunate coincidence, our trip is happening over what they call "Semana Santa" or "Holy Week" here: "holy" because it is the week leading up to Easter. In this culture, unlike the US, Semana Santa is a huge deal. The reason I say "unfortunate" is that during the latter part of the week (now), it's impossible to get anything done or even to get anywhere. That is, impossible to get anything done because everybody has off work, and impossible to get anywhere because of all the "processions." On the other hand, it was an excellent cultural experience, and gave us a chance to do some street evangelism, as described in the next posting.

At right you see a picture of one of these "processions". In addition to marching bands and long lines of people dressed up in special costumes (purple and white robes for the men, black dresses for the women), they have special floats used only in Semana Santa called "andas". "Anda" is Spanish for "walks", perhaps so called because the float travels by being carried on the shoulders of men or women walking down the street, or maybe because as it goes down the street it sways from left to right like some giant drunk caterpillar. As you can see, these can be rather large: for the anda above, there were probably close to 50 men carrying it, plus men at the front and back to help steer it; the even larger one below may have as many as 60.

Through Semana Santa, the different processions commemorate different activities in Christ's last week before His crucifixion. The anda at left is probably the most spectacular one, all lit up with a glass coffin in the middle with a statue of Jesus in it. We thought it looked like a small cruise ship, all lit up as it was. Following this anda there was, as with most andas, a band following playing music that they obviously felt was appropriate.

Another amazing feature of Semana Santa is the beautiful alfombras ("carpets", an interesting word for which Spanish speakers no doubt owe thanks to the Arabs that populated Spain for hundreds of years) that people make in the streets. These alfombras are typically made with a base of either colored sawdust or pine needles; beyond that, almost anything goes. The one at right is made entirely of sawdust: they put down pieces of wood for the edges and start filling in with sawdust. Then, after building up a base layer, they start adding layers of other colors using wooden stencils or sometimes freehand. Many alfombras, especially later in the week, are much more elaborate: examples of some I saw had birdcages all down the center, thousands of fresh-cut roses, or birds carved out cantaloupes and watermelons. Nobody is allowed to walk on these until the andas pass by; immediately after, street cleaning crews come along and sweep up the remains. Thus, these beautiful artistic "carpets" take many hours to create but sometimes only a few minutes before they are destroyed.

The entire week is dedicated to two things: the grisly death of Jesus, and the victory of Mary (or "la virgen" as they call her). Though I don't have any problem with portraying the death of Jesus as what it was, to focus on solely that is only half the story. As Carol, our hostess, pointed out, though there were many processions and events associated with Jesus' death on the cross, in the entire city of Antigua, there is not one single official ceremony associated with the resurrection of Jesus. On the schedule they gave out, there were indeed two resurrection events... but they were both in different towns. Nothing in Antigua.

This is amazing to me. Now, in the US, Christian churches may not perfectly portray the death and resurrection of Jesus, but at least the resurrection (aka, Easter Sunday) is a widely celebrated event. In Antigua, it's virtually unknown. This is really presenting only half the story. And, as Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 15:16-19:

For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised; and if Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most to be pitied.

This is exactly the situation of so many people in Guatemala: dead in their sins. Of course, that is true of most of the people in the United States also. However, the thing you cannot miss about Guatemala is how religious the people are. Men pay significant amounts of money to carry the andas on their shoulders in the parades. Why? I believe, at least in part, it is so that they can do penance for their sins, trying to work their way to heaven. As Todd Friel has said recently on a Wretched Radio broadcast, when you remove the law of God (the ten commandments, etc) you always find legalism taking its place. We are all born Pelagians and unless born again, we will always try to work our way to heaven.

In the case of many (not all, of course) Guatemalans, they substitute a faith in Mary to save them. The number of andas carrying statues of Mary were staggering. For example, there was the procession that featured the anda shown above, where Jesus was suffering under the load of carrying his cross. What shocked me was that, immediately after that anda with the suffering Jesus, came an anda with a triumphant Mary (shown at left). Think of it: Jesus couldn't take the punishment, so Mary comes along to make everything right. Another example is in the "La Merced" cathedral, which is a beautiful church; but the centerpiece of its altar is a small suffering Jesus on the cross, with a huge triumphant Mary above. I wish I could say these were isolated examples, but, sadly, they are not.

Now, don't get me wrong: I have great respect for Mary. As the mother of Jesus in His earthly incarnation, she was greatly honored among women. But, as she herself says in Luke 1:46-47:

"My soul glorifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior..."

Mary knew that she needed a Savior, just like the rest of us. And it's clear that she knew that Jesus was that Savior.

Also, don't get me wrong in thinking that I condemn the Semana Santa proceedings. Some evangelicals do, especially native Guatemalans: I do not. In fact, many of the processions and events are very beautiful, and show a deep reverence for Christ and for what He did for us on the cross. No Christian should ever forget that, and I do not see a problem with graphic reminders. The problem I have is that these sorts of things can very easily take on a life of their own, and become more important than the original thing which they are commemorating. And it's very clear that so many people in the city have made this mistake, worshipping and serving created things (as Romans 1:25 reminds us) rather than the Creator, who is forever praised. Amen!

Guatemala 2010: Building water filters

2010-03-31T17:07:00.014-04:00

Three of our days down here have been spent building and fixing water filters. This was originally the primary ministry of the Kendalls down here in Guatemala: at first, Forrest built and installed all the filters himself. At left you can see a filter that's used by Forrest at the filter factory. It's really just a concrete box with a "nose" on the front - Ja and I think they look like tiny Easter Island heads. As explained in the wikipedia article, you pour dirty water in the top, and it filters down through the layers of "schmutzdecke", sand and gravel: when it reaches the bottom, it's clean. There's a small device to collect the water - a plastic bottle cap - and a plastic tube that carries the water up the side and out the end of the "nose". You can see the plastic tube sticking out in the picture at left.

Watching them, I was thinking how Forrest and Carol make such a great team installing the filters: Forrest sets them up, while Carol teaches the women how to use them properly. The latter part is extremely important, because although the filters are pretty tough, the biological filtration system needs to be handled properly. They need to use it regularly, keep water flowing through it (to ensure the schmutzdecke stays alive), regularly clean the spout, make sure they use clean buckets to catch the water, etc.

What many of the people will do without this training is actually fairly amazing: they will take their buckets off the ground, fill them with dirty water, pour the water into the top of the filter, then put that same bucket under the spout to catch the clean water (thus contaminating it). Or, they will take a bucket of clean water and then dip a dirty cup into the clean water. Or, they don't keep the lid on top of the filter and (as happened to one filter in Tzancha) there were disease-carrying cockroaches living in the top. So Carol needs to spend considerable time with the women explaining to them how to properly use the filters and keep the clean and dirty water separated and prevent contamination. Clearly, a lot of this has nothing to do per se with the filter: they need basic instruction in hygiene. Carol takes on most of this training, usually requiring the services of a local translator to translate from Spanish to whatever Mayan language that particular group speaks.

If there's any question as to why they need these filters, just take a look at the picture to the right. This is a picture I took looking towards upstream over the river that flows behind Forrest's water filter factory. Notice all the pipes sticking out of the wall of the housing units: those are sewer pipes, dumping raw sewage directly into the river. People either take water directly out of this river to drink, or at best use a municipal water supply which is barely processed. I also learned that the municipal supplies often stop working for days at a time, which means back to the rivers they go.

So, the filters are something they badly need whether they know it or not. After the filters are built, they have to be delivered and installed. As I said, they are pretty tough, but they have to be used properly to ensure that the bio layer continues working properly, and occasionally the filters themselves have problems. For example, while we were in Tzancha we learned that a number of the filters had developed a problem wherein the water went in clear and came out yellow and smelling bad (though tasting ok). So, part of the job of installing filters is going back periodically and checking that they are working properly, and replacing or fixing them when they are not.

The trip to Tzancha (where I met my young friend Sandra) was exactly this kind of "checkup" trip. On this trip, Carol took along a bunch of buckets with covers on top and a spigot on the bottom. I asked what they were and she said "bribes." What she meant was that she checks whether they've been using their filter properly and, if so, she gives them some kind of gift: an incentive to do it correctly. In this case, the bucket (shown at right). The bucket turns out to be extremely important: as explained above, it's important to catch the water from the filter in a clean container and then ensure the water is not contaminated before they use it. The bucket is perfect: they use it only for clean water, it has a cover to keep out flies, and a spigot so they don't dip their dirty cups and bottles into the clean water supply.

The construction process itself is quite interesting: they use steel molds in the shape of the filter, then surround the center part with chicken wire to give the concrete some strength in tension. Then they run the plastic tube down the side and pour concrete into the mold. After the concrete is cured, they remove the mold. At this point, the filter may be ready to install. I say may be because there are a variety of things that can go wrong, from cracks in the concrete to fixes that are necessary because of changing filter designs. In the filters at left, a change in design from the organization the Kendalls work with required us to cut off the "noses" of the filters so that the outlet tube was approximately an inch higher than where it was poured. So, we had to cut off the noses with a diamond blade saw and then patch things up with fiberglass cloth and epoxy resin. (The resin is the dark stuff you can see around the noses.) Also, a number of them leaked because they were incorrectly de-molded, so we had to patch the bodies up, as we did with the filter on the left.

This is clearly a fairly labor-intensive job, so the Kendalls have now trained a number of other people how to build and install these filters. I asked them how many filters they had put in here and they didn't know: over a thousands was the best guess (including all the filters put in by people they trained). That's excellent: teach other ministries how to fish instead of just giving them fish, and let them multiply the filters in this country that needs them so badly.

Guatemala 2010: From Ja, Tuesday

2010-03-30T23:05:00.011-04:00

Hi, everybody. This is the first blog I've written for this trip. I can say so far it has been a great experience. As my dad has no doubt told you in the previous entries, we have met warm, loving Christians and built water filters. Today, we went to a refugee camp called Tzancha, where refugees from a landslide 5 years ago were living to install a water filter for a family. The particular family there already had one but it wasn't working properly (it was later determined that the problem was that the sand was bad).

It was kind of like being in the home of a family that everyone loves. The people staying in the house were very friendly and were Christians. The children, besides being adorable, were happy, playful, and respectul. The only difference: Instead of living in a nice, furnished American home, these people were living in poverty. The first thing I noticed about the place was how dirty it was. There was dirt and trash everywhere. There were flies everywhere. Now that their water filter had broken, they didn't even have clean water to drink, meaning that they could very possibly get diseases from the contaminated water. Many of the people, including the children, had lice and scabies. And still, these people were happy. Here's what hit me: how many of us in America, even Christians, would dispair and hate life if they were put in these conditions?

Of course, you might say that it's easier for them because they've been living like this for their whole lives. This is true, but an important point still stands: you don't need money, or a nice house, or any of our material possessions to be happy. All they needed to be happy was their family, their friends, and God. They were living close to their friends and family, they were strong in their faith, and they were happy. This point is something many Americans need to hear amidst the hustle and many times self-centeredness of our lives.

Looking forward to the rest of the trip, I'll blog more later.

-Ja

Guatemala 2010: Que te presente a mi amiga Sandra

2010-03-30T23:04:00.014-04:00

Let me introduce you to my friend Sandra.

She turns ten years old in May, is just as cute as can be, and has a bubbly personality and infectious smile. In fact, she reminds me very much of Danning. She latched onto me as soon as we got there today. Where is "there"? A refugee camp called Tzancha (pronounced "san-CHA"), originally created for the victims of the mudslides caused by Hurricane Stan back in 2005. It was supposed to be a temporary location for the refugees, six months maximum. Five years later, they're still there.

Sandra speaks perfect Spanish, extremely scanty English - but she's eager to learn more - and her native language, Tz'utujil ("su-tu-HIL"). One of the many surprises that awaited me in Guatemala was that many of the adults in these areas don't speak Spanish. Rather, they speak Mayan languages. These languages are all different, but it appears they are related; I learned to say "thank you" in Tzutujil you say "mat-i-OSH", while in Kaqchikel, the language of my friend Oscar, they say "MET-i-osh". I have no idea how to spell these words. Thankfully, Sandra's Spanish is excellent, so she and I had no problem talking all day.

It is really amazing when you think about it: here's a ten year old in Guatemala who speaks some ancient (and nearly extinct) Indian language, and an old gringo like me from the US who speaks English, yet we could communicate perfectly using Spanish. I keep thinking of C.S. Lewis's saying: "Ïf you aim for heaven, you will get earth thrown in in the bargain; if you aim for earth, you will get neither." It's the same here: I have no doubt that if I learned Spanish to take part in the rich Hispanic culture, eventually it would get old; because I learned it to minister to Latinos, I get the culture thrown in in the bargain, and get frequent delights. Since I was in Spanish school in Costa Rica, I have never spent so much time in a day speaking Spanish. 2.5 hours in the car each way sitting next a friend of the ministry, Christy, who spoke only Spanish and three hours or so playing with the kids and talking with their parents.

At one point, my young friend proudly led me back and showed me her family's garden: a small plot with strawberries, tomatillos, and other types of plants growing there. There were also chickens running all over. ("Cuál es tu comida [food] favorita?"I asked her. "Pollo"- chicken - she responded.) It's amazing that all these people can live on this amount of food, but I think they also bring limited amounts in from the outside: they were making tortillas, though I saw no corn growing nearby. That was something else I learned: here in Guatemala, they eat tortillas made of corn - not wheat as in Mexico and Costa Rica. They also enjoy that tasty dish made from corn tortillas and cheese or chicharones: the pupusa. I always thought pupusas were a purely Salvadoran specialty.

I spent several hours playing with Sandra and her siblings and cousins. We had so much fun, but it is really sobering to think not only that these kids are growing up in terrible poverty, most have lice and many have scabies. It's heart-breaking to think of it. Thankfully, there are a number of excellent ministries like Servants4Him down here trying to help as much as they can. They support the health of the people in many ways: water filters for clean water, medicines and other health supplies, medical and dental clinics, and various types of health classes. Yesterday, while we worked on the water filter - and I kept the kids busy - Carol Kendall and Christy did a class for the women in the village, teaching them how to keep their families healthy. (One of the suggestions on the instructions they gave them: "Bathe frequently, at least twice a week." That's "frequent" down here.) They needed a translator: one young lady who looked like she was about 14 translated for them from Spanish into Tzutujil.

One final delight: one of them was tapping on a rock with a large bolt, so I started drumming a rhythm with my hands on a bottle of bleach. Sandra went and found a few empty plastic bottles and a bucket, so we started all playing music together. I asked if there were any other instruments around and one of the kids brought over an old plastic xylophone. I played "Jesus Loves Me"and they all joined in: "Jesús me ama, Jesús me ama, Jesús me ama, la Biblia dice así." Several then sang other Sunday school songs for me.

Think of it: an impromptu jam session with kids in a refugee camp singing in our shared secondary language in the hills of Guatemala. Truly, I aimed for heaven and got earth thrown in.

Guatemala 2010: Concrete is your friend

2010-03-29T11:23:00.015-04:00

Many of the things that the Kendalls install down here are made of concrete. At first it doesn't make a lot of sense: it's heavy, can break if mistreated or overheated, and carrying it into the country would be prohibitive because of the weight. However, the more I thought about it, the more it made sense. It's strong, it's durable, it can be used to fabricate many different kinds of structures and objects, and best of all it only requires one component to be brought in from outside: bags of cement. The rest of the components of concrete - the sand, the water, the stone aggregate - are all readily available locally.

Two of the objects the Kendalls install in people's homes are water filters and stoves. Both are made primarily of concrete. On the way back from Oscar's house, we got to visit the factory where they construct the stoves. At right is one of the stoves they install. There are several models, but this one has a number of useful features including "wings" on the sides that can act as counters or tables. The stoves are very important because without them, the people need to use open-air fires, which are extremely inefficient: more smoke, less usable heat. Note the parts of the stove: the base, the firebox (which has wood sticking out above), and the "plancha" or steel plate on top. This gives them the closest thing to burners they get. Building the stove correctly is very important, because one of the many things we learned about concrete was that if it is subjected to too much heat, it breaks.

The stove seen above was actually in use at the stove factory, which is operated by a friendly entrepreneur with the solid Roman name of Marco Tulio, shown at left. (For those who forget their ancient Roman history, the personal names of the orator we know as Cicero was Marcus Tullius. I understand that this is a fairly common name down here in Guatemala.) Marco Tulio makes stoves for the Kendalls' ministry, as well as a number of other groups down here: many of the stoves we saw had the Rotary International insignia on them. He's got a fabrication process down so he can sell the stoves to ministries and clubs like Rotary as inexpensively as possible.

The Kendalls install stoves they buy from Marco Tullio's factory, but their primary ministry has always been installing water filters. They construct the water filters themselves, in their own factory. For several days now we have been working in the water filter factory, learning a bit of concrete work while we're at it. The filters use a technology called "BioSand". Here's a wikipedia article on BioSand filters, but the upshot is that there's a layer of sand that filters the water with a "schmutzdecke", or "slime layer". The filter is also made of concrete, meaning it's quite heavy, but also very durable.

Concrete also gives families the only real floors in their houses they have. Wood floors are unknown: it's either concrete or dirt. (Wood is either used for furniture or, perhaps more often, to make the "native crafts" sold in the markets and the airport.) And many floors, unfortunately, are just dirt - or, in the rainy season, mud. So, concrete floors are almost a luxury - not to mention being much more sanitary than dirt.

Guatemala 2010: Day one

2010-03-27T13:35:00.009-04:00

We arrived here in Guatemala yesterday. We are staying with Kendalls, who are a wonderful husband-and-wife team with whom we used to attend church together at Grace Bible Church. They decided about 7 years ago that God was leading them down here to Guatemala and have been here ever since. They have a ministry, Servants4Him, which started as a ministry where they install water filters. We in the US don't recognize it, but most of the world does not have access to a source of clean water. The water most of the people use here is either straight from a (usually dirty) stream, or at best from the municipal water supply. They do some processing on the water, basically allowing sediment to settle out and then treating with a small amount of chlorine. The "small amount" means that one day a week they add some chlorine to the water, which means, as Carol explained it, if you get water on the day they add the chlorine, it's not too bad... but if you get it six days later, it's in bad shape. So, they build and install water filters - which I will tell more about in a later post.

Like many countries of the world (or parts of the US), Guatemala is a land of contrasts. There are (a few) very nice houses in gated communities, right down the street from people living in incredible poverty. We visited one such family today, shown in the picture above. This is the family of Oscar (the young man at the left side of the picture above, whom the Kendalls try to give odd jobs to whenever they can). There were 21 family members living together on a small, filthy plot. Part of it had concrete floors, and part had actual block walls; but even this is better than many people. Apparently they have relatives who work in the US and send money back home. Unfortunately, even this does not help their standard of living very much. The clothes they wear are either ones they make themselves (and sell at the markets to the tourists) or else second-hand or factory seconds sent from the US and Canada.

The children seemed to be relatively happy, climbing all over each other and us. However, in talking to our host in the house (seen at left in the picture above), they frequently need medicine. He also told us his youngest, a beautiful little one-year old girl, constantly suffered from "mal del estomago"- i.e. pains in her abdomen. I had always had the idea that locals get some kind of immunity in their systems to combat the bad water - turns out they just get used to it and don't complain too much. It bothers them nearly as much as it bothers us gringos, we just complain more. What pained me also to see was that many of the youngsters had massive tooth decay. For several, all their front teeth were black and eaten up at the edges. I now see why Forrest and Carol, in addition to their water ministry, also sponsor periodic dental and medical clinics.

I can really see the all-around ministry the Kendalls have. When they are in a person's home, they often note other things that need to be done to the home. In Oscar's home, they noted that they don't have any good stove - they just cook on an open flame. Not only does this cause a lot of smoke in the house ("hay mucho humo" as the matron of the family told me), open fires are also very inefficient. And since they have to gather wood by hand and carry it back to their house (we saw several families doing just that on our way back yesterday), efficiency is a big deal. Oscar told me they spend four hours every day just gathering firewood. What's more, the kitchen roof was just a piece of corrugated steel that not only didn't cover all the area, it was actually sloped in the wrong direction, so all the rain pours right into their house. So, the Kendalls are planning on also installing a new, efficient stove and replacing the roof. More on stoves in my next installment.

Guatemala is a wonderful land with more people with needs than one could ever fill. You could easily completely lose yourself in people's needs and end up burning yourself out. Or, like most of us, we can not fill them. Best of all, like the Kendalls, you can fill people's needs but try not to get completely consumed. My hope is that more of us - myself inclueded - take more after the Kendalls.

Postcards from Guatemala: coming soon...

2010-03-10T14:34:00.003-05:00

My son Ja and I will be taking a trip to Guatemala to work with friends of ours who are with Servants4Him. (Actually, they ARE Servants4Him ...) While we're down there, we will be posting blog entries as often as we can. We'll be posting pictures, stories about what we see, and ways you can pray for us while we're there. And if you are seeing this and have not yet supported my son helping him to pay for his part of the trip, you can do so directly on the Servants4Him web site - just choose "Ja Bisaga" as the missionary/project (and believe me, he is both :-)

Thanks for your interest and support. God bless you and we look forward to see what God's doing down in Guatemala!

Commentary on "Garden of Love" by William Blake

2009-10-30T09:30:00.003-04:00

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

2009-08-14T14:16:00.003-04:00

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

2009-02-09T23:14:00.003-05:00

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)

2008-07-11T10:57:00.007-04:00

[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

2008-07-07T21:29:00.004-04:00

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?

2008-05-22T15:58:00.003-04:00

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

2008-05-16T07:46:00.003-04:00

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. :-)

I'm sorry Christians do things in church that annoy you ...

2008-04-23T18:51:00.007-04:00

But frankly, church is primarily for believers, and not primarily for unbelievers. That's the tough truth. This all started with a posting by a fellow who calls himself the Friendly Atheist. Mr. FA really seems quite a reasonable fellow, and probably a nicer guy in person than I am myself. Truthfully, I know where he's coming from: I can understand some of these things annoying him. Some of them annoy me, too. But emotions and thinking are two different things, and I think it's important to rationally separate things that annoy one about church (or anything, for that matter) into several categories:

Things that annoy for purely emotional reasons
Things that annoy because they are unbiblical
Things that annoy because they are biblical, and the annoyee is unwilling to accept Biblical authority

I submit that items in the three categories are completely different. In a spirit of "friendliness" myself (hopefully), I'd like to examine each of the items on his list of things that annoy him about church, trying to use the above categories as a filter.

Wave their hands in front of my face making it impossible to see the stage.

Many Christians would agree with you on this one. Of course, for Bible believers, there is 1 Timothy 2:8 to deal with. I've heard this exegeted as referring to how Christians live their lives in general and having nothing to do with actually raising one's hands. Yeah, but ... the rest of the passage is not only about general behaviors but also about specific ones. Certainly, you can interpret "holy hands" as meaning "general works"; on the other hand, I am not familiar with a lot of uses of the word "hands" alone to mean "works." In all the passages this site quotes, the Scripture does not use "hands" as a synonym for works; in fact, each of them specifically says "the works of [one's] hands." This relates "hands" to "work" but at the same time contrasts them.

Now, I do understand that "hands" may be used metonymically, and "holy hands" mean "undefiled actions"; thus I think it's a reasonable conclusion to draw that God does want our actions to be undefiled. However, I'd want a little stronger support for the thesis that the believer's works are all Paul had in mind when he mentions "hands" here. What I'm saying is that it seems to me at least as plausible to interpret this use of hands literally as metonymically, especially given the existence of similar prayer positions in the Old Testament.

On the other hand, actually waving one's hands in somebody else's face is just plain rude. "All things are permissible but not all edify."
Yell out random words (“Praise Jesus,” “Hallelujah!”) while I’m trying to listen to the sermon.

This one I agree with. I don't see any Biblical precedent for doing such a thing.
Walk in after the music— or worse yet, the sermon— has started.

I agree with this, but unfortunately it doesn't always work out that way. Everybody knows Sunday morning is the most hectic time of the week. I would suggest a bit of grace in dealing with people, a little less judgmentalism - "Judge not, etc."
Look at me with anxiety because I’m brown.
Look at me with excitement because I’m not white.

I haven't seen such things personally, but I agree that they have no place in church. The only thing I'd say about point number 5 is that many believers want less self-segregation on Sunday mornings, more worshiping the Lord together regardless of race, and that leads to that reaction. Again, I would urge some tolerance here of #5; for #4 there is no excuse.
Assume that because I know about the Bible, I must believe in the Bible.

Well, as a first cut, is this an unreasonable assumption to make? After all, if you were to walk into an atheist's meeting a good first guess would be that you were there because ... wait for it ... you were an atheist? If you go to a meeting of Spanish speakers, wouldn't a good initial assumption be ... that you speak Spanish? Now, if they persist in thinking you a believer after you make your position known (gently and thoughtfully, one would hope), they should change their opinion. But as a first guess, this seems perfectly reasonable to me.

Additionally, you have to understand where some of these thoughts come from: churches that have fallen into the abyss of seeker-sensitivity. I have to say, it's obvious from many of your comments the kind of churches you've been visiting. In those churches, the assumption is that there's a small set of people who are serious believers, a certain set of people who are unbelievers, and a great mass of people who are what one might call semi-believers (see next point). In reality, of course, there is no such thing: either you is, or you ain't. They naturally therefore assume that if you know the Bible you fall into the first category.
Perform a skit that is supposed to tell the day’s message.

All I can say to this one is "Amen, preach it brother!"
Tell me I’m on the “right path” by being there.

It depends on what they mean by this. If they are following the typical seeker-sensitive semi-Pelagian idea that you're moving yourself ever closer to Christ, then I totally disagree with them. But if they mean that by being there you may hear something that may change your life and they're glad for that, then I totally agree with them. (See #13.)

Now, I should say that I don't think this is a good thing to say something like this to somebody, and likely would not say it myself. However, the reality is that most people who you might have heard say this are probably just opening their mouth before engaging their brains. I mean, think about it from their point of view: they meet you, and based on your apparent knowledge of some of the Scripture, assume you're a believer. Then you rock their world by telling them (gently, I hope) that you're an atheist. Many people would be slightly flummoxed in this kind of situation, especially for those who have not encountered many atheists before. An awkward silence ensues, and they want to say something, anything. So, to fill the silence, they (unwisely) say the first thing that pops into their minds.

I don't know about you, but I've later kicked myself for saying many of the things I have said in such situations in my life. Perhaps you are better composed than the rest of us; but have a little tolerance for those who without as strong a constitution.
Pass out Christian business directories.

Well, there are various schools of thought on these directories. I don't think they're appropriate to "pass out" in church, and I haven't seen that literally happen anyway. But, while I don't use them myself that often, I don't see a problem with having them. There are two valid ways of looking at them, and your purely utilitarian examples are not either of them. First, some people interpret 2 Cor. 6:14 specifically as applying not only to marriages and close friendships but also to business relationships. For them, a natural outworking of their faith in their life requires them to work with Christians wherever possible. So can't you be tolerant of their sincerely-held convictions even if they differ from your own? Second, we are called to be good stewards of our money. Some people feel that wherever possible, it should be kept in the Christian community. I am not sure whether I feel the same way; but let's turn it around. I do wonder what your take would be on things like the Black Business Directory? Is that a valid discrimination to make? If that kind, why not this? Even if we conclude that neither is a valid discrimination, it seems a "live and let live" attitude is probably appropriate here.

On the other hand, I don't know whether to react to your strawman example of "brown lawyers" with laughter or pity. I don't know where you have been, but I have been in a large number of churches since my conversion from Buddhism/agnosticism/Unitarianism 13 years ago; and I cannot think of a single one of them where "brown" people have been looked down on.
Ask me if they can pray for me.

All I can go by here is my experience, and my experience in the responses of people (both believers and unbelievers) when I ask this question is an unbroken string of positive responses. Everybody I have said this to has responded with thanks for my thoughtfulness, even if they do not share in my belief; this is true whether they are Christian, agnostic, Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim, or Wiccan. Where I come from, it's customary to thank people for thoughtfulness. Maybe that's just me though.
Ask me if they can pray for me, then put their hands on my shoulders and begin praying.

There is clearly Biblical precedent for this, whether for the purposes of blessing or invoking the Holy Spirit. As with item #1, not all will take such Biblical uses of "hands" so literally, although the New Testament is pretty clear that it was a normative practice at one time at least. Certainly, the Bible does not support performing this action when the other person is clearly uncomfortable or annoyed by it, so it would probably be best to not practice it in encounters with you specifically. Again, though, I urge you to have tolerance of those who take this as a natural practice, and appreciate their thoughtfulness and intentions even if you disagree with them. A friend who is of uncertain-to-me faith (as far as I can tell, sort of a roll-your-own Buddhist/Wiccan) recently told me that she was going to send prayers for my healing to an uncertain destination and I believe do some ritual involving candles. I don't accept her belief or practice, but I am sincerely appreciative of her intentions, and thanked her that she would think enough of me to offer prayers for me, even if I think she's offering them to the wrong place.
Mischaracterize people of other faiths or no faiths.

I have never heard anybody say that Muslims really want to become Christians; I think the Bible is clear that unbelievers are perfectly happy in their state until God regenerates their hearts. As for the atheists comment, there is both Scriptural authority and experience to back such a comment up. I hang around on Yahoo! Answers a lot, and I can tell you that the vast majority of atheists I meet up with there are totally ignorant about what Christianity and the Bible really teach (irrespective of how many years they "served" in Christian ministries, or how many out-of-context factoids from the Bible they know) yet hate it with a passion. (Please understand that I am not putting you in the same category with these neo-atheist fundies.) Now, do they know God is there? Obviously, I don't know for sure, but that explanation is the best one I can think of for their irrational blind hatred of Christianity.
Assume that everyone who is not Christian must be “saved.”

You answered "I’m quite alright." Actually, friend, you're not. I know you think you are alright. But you, being an intelligent and thoughtful person, should understand something that, in my experience, so few atheists have a grasp on. That's a shame, because it is at the crux of this whole discussion. And that is this: You believe that you're alright the way you are; but any Christian cannot possibly believe that. There's a clash of fundamental worldviews going on here. You believe that Christianity is nothing real and objective; it's a man-made practice that some people may choose to follow, and others may not, and good luck to them all. (After the tiring tirades of people like Richard Dawkins, this is a welcome change, believe me.)

But please understand that a Christian cannot believe that. We believe in Christianity not because we like it, or because it makes us feel good, but because we believe that it's true. The founder of our faith said that nobody comes to the Father except through Him. We must believe, if we are Christians, that the fate of those who are not reconciled to God through Him are destined for the lake of fire. Which, I hasten to add, is where every single one of us deserves to go, Christian or non-Christian. It's only by being saved by the grace of God, through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, that I myself was literally saved from the hell I most richly deserve.

I must ask you: once I believe that this is all true, how can I not believe everybody needs to be saved?

Now, I'm not asking you to accept this worldview and make it your own. I understand that you don't and won't. But I am asking you to not assume, without argument, that Christians should accept your worldview. We don't expect you to accept ours; grant us the same luxury.
Bring their children, then proceed to fall asleep during the sermon.

Again, amen, preach it brother!
Say that those of other Christian denominations aren’t practicing “true” Christianity.

This is another one that I don't know how to respond to. On the one hand, it is true, we ought to practice love and tolerance of people who interpret the Bible differently than we do. On the other hand, this is an old saw, and one that, in my experience, is brought up by unbelievers as a justification of why they are not believers themselves far more than it's actually said by Christians. On the other other hand, if you believe that something is real and objective, there is a "right" way to describe and practice it, and many "wrong" ways. Again, it comes down to worldview. If something is personal and subjective, there is no right and wrong; not so if it's something real and objective.

Even this doesn't mean, of course, that everybody who has a different understanding of the Bible is totally wrong in every way. It doesn't even mean that everybody who practices other faiths (or no faith at all) is wrong in every way. Obviously, that wouldn't make any sense, if for no other reason that one cannot come to an understanding of the goodness of God without having the same basic standard of "goodness" to use. Still, there are right beliefs and practices, and wrong ones, and it's perfectly Biblical to be discerning in recognizing the difference. Just don't let it separate you from other believers.
Look at their watches mid-sermon.

Heart attitude here, as with most things, is front and center. I agree that one should not be counting the minutes until the end of the sermon; but everybody is probably guilty of this once in a while. I, for one, am intensely interested in what the preacher has to say, following in my Bible and/or taking notes. However, I have probably glanced at the clock before, either purely out of habit or because some specific event is looming large in my mind. Chalk it up to human frailty.
Pray for things they can just as easily take care of themselves.

Honestly, where did you get the idea that just because somebody is praying for a promotion, they're not working harder? That people pray for good grades on testing instead of actually studying? For a smart and apparently experienced guy, you don't know very much about actual Christians and their behavior. In every situation like this I've ever seen, the Christian will pray (because the Bible tells us to) and then work their hardest to make the desired situation a reality. I know you don't think the prayer will do any good, but we do. We don't see prayer as alternative to work, but an adjunct. Surely, if God is what Christians say He is (real, good, omnipotent, etc) it's a reasonable thing to ask for His help/protection/etc?

I'm afraid the old saw "so heavenly minded they're no earthly good" is just that, an old saw. The most heavenly-minded people I know are also the ones working hardest for their and others' earthly good.
Pastors tell stories without giving citations.

I generally agree with this one. In fact, I don't think "stories" of any kind should be a major part of what goes on in a sermon. Again, it appear that you have been visiting a lot of seeker-sensitive churches, so you've heard a lot of stories; but a large number of churches think Biblical exposition should be front and center instead of stories. Occasional stories can help illustrate a point; but they should not make up the bulk of the sermon.

On the other hand, would you really expect any person making a speech or presentation to stop every time he referenced something to read the associated bibliographic entry for the point? Let's not go overboard here.
Pastors ask questions with obvious answers.

I agree with you. But I'd most likely take the kind of example you cited (“Who here believes the Lord is going to save them today?!”) as an annoying but pardonable personal eccentricity on the part of the preacher. Charles Stanley says "Now listen" a lot; Guillermo Maldonado says "Vamos aca, iglesia" (loosely, "now stay with me, church"). One shouldn't make a mountain out of a molehill. On the other hand, this is number 19; I don't take an example given to fill out the magic number of "20" as being the main argument. :-)
Pastors take an hour to analyze a simple, straight-forward Biblical verse.

Some preachers can certainly over-discuss a single verse. I remember in a comparative religions class I took in college, the professor giving us an example of a preacher who made an entire sermon out of the King James expression "and it came to pass." He explained how this meant that everything passes away, nothing is constant. (I note that even the Mormons are getting into that act.) C'mon, it was just a common expression used at certain times. On the other hand, there are many verses that are difficult to understand without grasping the whole Sitz im Leben of the passage. Lacking this understanding, going "proof-texting," is behind many misunderstandings of Biblical verses. For example, only by ignoring the context in the entirety of Scripture can Tony Campolo reach some of his conclusions.

So, a balance is necessary between too much and too little. Unfortunately, one person's "too much" may be another person's "too little"; and most tragically of all, one person's "too much" may actually be "exactly what that person needs, whether they want it or not."

Review of the book "How to Talk About Jesus Without Freaking Out"

2008-04-08T00:43:00.003-04:00

As I am involved in leading a group in the Way of the Master series and am very interested in getting better (and braver!) about sharing my faith, I recently picked up the book How to Talk About Jesus Without Freaking Out from my bookshelf in order to read it again. I bought it a few years ago after hearing the authors visit Janet Parshall's radio show while on their book tour. I found it an interesting comparison to the Way of the Master series. I thought it would be interesting to write a review here; I have also posted a slightly modified version of this review on Amazon.

I should start by saying that there's a number of things to like about this book. First off, any book that encourages believers to get out there and share their faith, personally (as in, one-on-one) is to be commended. Too many believers - myself included, too often - let "the church" do the hard work of bringing the Gospel to their unbelieving friends. That is, they invite their friends to the latest cool event at their church - the latest BBQ, pool party, Christian music event, etc. - and assume that somehow they are doing the person a spiritual favor by being their friend. In other words, the standard paradigm for most people taking part in "relationship" or "friendship" evangelism. Because, let's face it, a lot of us think we're sharing the Gospel when we're really just being friends with somebody and hoping that they'll bring up the question for us. I've had to face the fact that it's a lot easier to be friends with somebody than it is to actually share the Gospel with them.

So, this book offers a lot of encouragement to go out on that limb and share the Gospel. This is a very good thing. All the music events, outdoor parties, and skateboard exhibitions will not bring a person to Christ unless somebody steps out in faith and shares with them.

Another thing to like about the book is that it has some practical ways to approach somebody and have conversations with them that approach spiritual topics. As the transition between the natural and the spiritual can be difficult, I think we can use as much help in that area as possible. It even commends the use of tracts, which is a much-maligned area of Christian witnessing. Now, I'm not talking Jack Chick tracts here - there are actually good ones out there. That's a good reminder in a world that seems to think that tracts are a backwards-looking way of witnessing. (And they're certainly better than no witnessing at all, which is, let's be honest, what most of us do.)

Where the book really falls down, though, is when it gets to the actual presentation of the Gospel and, more importantly, what comes before it. In a word, the Good News of Romans chapter 3 makes absolutely no sense until you really understand the Bad News of Romans 1 and 2. And I am sad to say that here there is very little help provided. The authors might respond "of course not, there's lot of help available in that area." I strenuously disagree. In fact, I'd say the opposite is true. There's plenty of help available about how to be friendly and non-threatening - in fact, that comes pretty natural to most of us - but precious little help available showing us how to really share the Biblical Gospel, something that causes people's hearts to be converted.

For example, the idea of sin is barely even mentioned. The authors briefly mention the Romans Road and the 4 Spiritual Laws, but leave it at that; as if the presentation of sin were the easiest and most natural thing in the world. Now, I am not saying that these techniques are not useful structures to use in witnessing. They can give you a useful framework to help peg in your memory. However, again I contend that the discussion of sin and showing the person's truly lost condition is the hard part of witnessing, and the most vital part: all the talks and friendship in the world are a piece of cake compared to that sticky work. And this book does virtually nothing to help you out in that area.

It also presents the unfortunate theology of "Decisional Regeneration" - that it's the person's decision that saves them; until they make that decision they're vulnerable, but once they do, they're good to go, heaven-wise. This may seem like abstract, worthless nitpicking; but I submit that a person's theology makes a huge difference. For what is belief in Jesus but (at one level) a theology? Now, true conversion is a lot more than merely theology; it is a complete regeneration of the heart by God's grace that comes through repentance and faith in Jesus Christ. But it is no less than theology. What I am saying is that a certain amount of theology is necessary for even coming to faith in Christ; and the theology of Decisional Regeneration starts people out with the wrong understanding. Can a person who believes in Decisional Regeneration be saved? Of course they can; but I would argue that it's in spite of that belief, not because of it.

So, in conclusion, this book is a good book to read. But it is far from the complete story on how to share the complete Biblical Gospel with people. In fact, this book might be a good companion to the (lamentably) few books out there that really talk about the full presentation of the Gospel, the presentation of that Good News as the antidote to the Bad News that must come first in somebody's understanding. Much written by John MacArthur or John Piper would be useful; the most useful of all (though not perfect either) would be the Way of the Master series by Ray Comfort and friends.

If you take this book for what it's good for, I do recommend it; but don't take it as anything like the complete way to share the Gospel with your friends. If you do that, then it can be more dangerous than not doing it at all, since they will think they've heard the Gospel when they really have not.

My own theological position

2008-04-03T07:07:00.005-04:00

I thought it might be useful to lay out exactly what my own theological position is. I have said repeatedly that I am a monergist or Calvinist, but I should probably define a little better what I mean by that.

The basics: I believe in One God revealed in Three Persons eternally distinct; I believe God created the world by His word and sustains it by His power; I believe God the Father has planned all history and superintends it, and has a will and plans for all history; I believe Jesus is fully God and fully man, was born of a virgin in Israel around 1 CE (give or take a few years); I believe Jesus suffered and died on the cross as a substitutionary atonement (or expiation), paying for the sins of myself and all believers throughout history, both before and after the cross; I believe that on the third day He rose again and ascended into heaven; I believe the Holy Spirit is God and is given to all believers as a Seal and a Sign of salvation; I believe the church consists of all believers throughout history from the Garden of Eden through the end, and God saves each one of us in the same way (solely by His grace, solely through faith); I believe that only through personally repenting of our sins and exercising faith in Christ's atonement can we be saved, although the body of believers has a real part to play in not only the discipleship and growth of Christians but also their conversion itself (e.g., loving others, preaching the Gospel, teaching God's word, holy living);I believe Jesus is coming again in righteousness to judge the living and the dead and to usher in the fullness of His kingdom, and that He will create a new heaven and a new earth (though at present we cannot really imagine what that will be like). In short, I believe what historic orthodox Christianity teaches, because I think that's what the Bible teaches.
As regards soteriology, I am a monergist (aka five-point Calvinist). I take the first point (man's total depravity due to the influence of sin) very seriously, and I believe that if you do take that point seriously, the only conclusion you can draw is the monergist one.
As regards eschatology, I don't have any dogmatic position. I believe the Bible is (intentionally) unclear on eschatology, and I think we should not be any more dogmatic than the Bible gives us warrant to be. I think the Bible generally teaches pre-millenialism, but I generally lean toward a post-tribulational understanding rather than the popular pre-tribulationalism of the "Left Behind" series and the dispensationalists. It seems to me the pre-trib position is plausible, but neither required by nor does it explain best the Biblical text.
As regards baptism, I believe the Bible indicates believer's baptism. I understand the arguments for paedobaptism but the lack of real examples or mandates for it in the Bible leans me toward credobaptism.
As regards pneumatology, I certainly believe that every believer in Jesus is indwelled by the Holy Spirit and also believe that as believers we are empowered by the Holy Spirit to do God's will. I do not believe there is any specific "second blessing" (e.g. speaking in tongues as at Pentacost) but rather the daily empowering by the Holy Spirit to do what God wants us to do. I am not a cessationist in the strict sense, since I believe the spiritual gifts (including sign gifts) have a place today as in all church history. However, I do not believe certain people have specific sign gifts - tongues, healing, etc.; that sort of individual gifting ended with the apostles, the foundation of the church. Now, I believe God can (and does) endow certain people with certain sign gifts at certain times; yet I don't think that any person can say "I have these sign gifts, you don't." I've found that this middle-of-the-road position ends up putting me at odds with both cessationists and continualists.

I lay these out because you have to have specific positions on specific points. Anybody who says they don't (and who is sincere) is not being truthful with themselves. However, I am also a great believer in "mere Christianity": that we are not saved by this or that theological position, but by the blood of Jesus Christ shed on Calvary, and that is more important than any particular theological position one may hold. I greatly respect many people whose theology I would differ with, and I confidently expect to see many of them in heaven one day. This is because the Bible says that to be saved we must repent of our sins and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ; not that we must be Calvinists or Arminians or Pre-Tribulationalists or Process Theologians.

In fact, I think it is a very interesting question exactly how much you must know to be a Christian or, to put it more properly, how much error God will allow you to hold to after He saves you. I have discussed this with my friends, but I do not pretend to have an answer; in fact, I think nobody does. That will have to be another blog posting. What I do know is that if we really realize our sinfulness, confess that sinfulness to God, and cry out to Him to be saved, then He will save us; this is why I believe so strongly in evangelistic methods like the Way of The Master and why friendship evangelism without conviction of sin is just friendship, not evangelism. That I believe the Bible teaches that at that point He has already saved us, and we are appropriating that salvation through our repentance and faith is rather less important. Important, but not That Important.

Hank Hanegraaff - Jumped the Shark?

2008-03-19T21:02:00.001-04:00

In my previous article on my own spiritual history, I mentioned some of the people who have been an influence on me. One person I forgot to mention was Hank Hanagraaff, especially through his "Bible Answer Man" radio show. He has had a huge influence on me, entirely for the better. In the early days of my Christianity, I had to drive about an hour to and from work. I found myself being drawn to Christian radio, at first to come up with reasons to oppose what they were saying (such is what our fallen will gets us!), but before long to learn from it. It is because of this time period of my life that I retain such a positive attitude about Christian radio. Christian television is, sadly, almost a wasteland with people like Fred Price, Kenneth Copeland, Robert Schuller, and T. D. Jakes filling the airwaves. Note that I say "almost": there are still good teachers and preachers on TV - people like Greg Laurie, John MacArthur, D. James Kennedy (RIP). In particular, I have recently discovered the "NRB" network (channel 378 on DirecTV) that seems to consist of almost completely solid preaching. Perhaps there is hope for Christian TV after all. Thankfully, Christian radio does not seem to have suffered quite as much from TV's downhill slide, perhaps because there is not as much money in it.

Anyway, because of my long commute, in those pre-MP3 days of the mid-90s I listened to a lot of Christian radio. I used to listen to so many programs - Hank's, John MacArthur, Dennis Rainey's Family Life Today, Tony Evans, even the corny radio drama "Unshackled." Though I don't have a commute anymore and so I don't listen to radio much, I am still very positive on Christian radio; I very seldom listen to any other radio stations - except, of course, when the Redskins are playing. It happened that Hank was on the radio exactly during my afternoon drive time. At first, I resisted what he had to say, but before long, after God changed my heart, I soaked it up. He spoke a lot of sense; he was obviously incredibly knowledgeable about the Bible; he had that quality of "holiness" about him.

Perhaps best of all, he supported the "mere Christian" idea I was learning to love from C. S. Lewis. That is, that we should not divide ourselves from other Christians, that we should (to use Hank's phrase), "debate vigorously but not divide." It is, I hope, with this spirit of "mere Christianity", that I write these blog postings. I heard him do this repeatedly even with positions that he disagreed with, and I respected him for it. For example, he wrote an article called "Safe and Sound" where he laid out his belief in the eternal security of the believer; and he was clear that he thought that the most Biblical position on the subject. However, he was always careful to emphasize that those who did not believe in eternal security were definitely within the "pale of orthodoxy," and never implied that such people had a faulty hermeneutic or a severe lack of understanding of the Bible. I learned to expect and respect and appreciate this kind of view of other Christians.

Then, a few years back, the "Left Behind" series started getting popular. There are many reasons not to like this series: two are that it is not well-written, and that it takes an extreme view of end times events that the vast majority of Bible-believing Christians throughout history have not believed and elevates it to dogma. (That it makes scads of money for its authors is neither here nor there.) So, Hank underwent his own quest to come to a conclusion on the end times; I recall that part of it included memorizing the entire book of Revelation.

He finally came to a conclusion, which is the orthodox partial preterist (amillenial) position. Now, I don't feel strongly about either the pre-tribulational or amillenial position; in fact it seems to me the most natural understanding of the Bible as a whole would lead one to a pre-millenial but post-tribulational view. But I naturally assumed that, in taking a view, he would treat other views the way he treated other doctrines he disagreed with.

So imagine my surprise to hear him using language against pre-tribulationists that I never heard him use with other views he disagreed with. He repeatedly said - and continues to say - they didn't know how to "read the Bible for all it's worth." I heard him very nearly equate John Nelson Darby's epiphany about dispensationalism to Joseph Smith's reception of the Book of Mormon from the angel Moroni. Then, I recently heard him blame the dispensationalist point of view for the sufferings of the Palestinian people; his idea seemed to be that the Palestinians suffer because America supports Israel, and the primary reason America supports Israel is because of dispensationalist preachers.

Now, I am no dogmatic dispensationalist (the doctrine seems to me plausible but not well-supported by Scripture) but this seems quite a bit excessive. I could imagine few things less like the "mere Christian" Hank that I had grown to know, respect, and love.

This was followed closely by another area of non-"mere Christian" response; and this second area is one that is far more important than eschatology. I am speaking, of course, of soteriology. He seems to be one of that popular but ill-defined breed, the "Calminian." He takes some views that seem more or less Calvinist (Total Depravity, Eternal Security), but rejects the tough Calvinist points (Unconditional Election, Irresistible Grace); sort of a "Calvinist Lite."

However, as with his eschatology, I am not so much disappointed with the position he takes as with the fact that his position is so harshly and vehemently anti-Calvinist. This, too, seems to me a relatively recent innovation in his thinking. Initially, when I was trying to sort out the questions of monergism vs. synergism, I heard Hank talk on several occasions about "libertarian" and "compatibilist" free will. This seemed to me very abstruse terminology, but something I wanted to understand. I recall hearing James White on his program - in fact, Hank's program is where I first heard Dr. White. He once held a live debate between two radically opposing viewpoints on soteriology: James White taking up the Calvinist position and Calvary Chapel's own George Bryson taking up what can only be called the anti-Calvinist position.

Over time he became more and more against the Calvinist position himself, similarly (it seems to me) as his transformation in the area of eschatology. Recently, he has gone completely off the deep end, equating the God of Calvinism with a "cosmic rapist" and saying that the Calvinist's God would be personally responsible for sin in the universe. (Why the Arminian's God, who apparently knew evil was going to happen but decided not to do anything about it, escapes the same criticism I'm not sure.)

With this, my disappointment in Hank was complete. He took simplistic, poorly-thought out criticisms of Calvinism and spread them far and wide. I now rarely listen to him. It is a real shame that the champion of "mere Christianity" would use such strong language against positions which I think he would admit are within the "pale of orthodoxy" (though, strangely, I have never heard him say on the radio).

Should we have strong opinions, and "discuss [them] vigorous without dividing?" Yes, about important topics. But to call names? That seems to me to be about as un-"mere Christian" and (more importantly) unloving and un-unified as you can get. Hank, whither hast thou gone?

C.S. Lewis the Calvinist?

2008-03-12T09:16:00.002-04:00

I have just finished re-reading Lewis's book "Surprised by Joy." I have always considered Lewis a pretty pure Arminian: he rejects Total Depravity, for example. (Of course, he totally misunderstands the doctrine, as I've found is often true for those who reject the 5 points). However, this quote from page 224 of the 1984 Harcourt Brace edition of Surprised by Joy, which refers to his own moment of conversion, made me wonder.

... I was in fact offered what now appears a moment of wholly free choice... I became aware that I was holding something at bay, or shutting something out... Neither choice was presented as a duty; no threat or promise was attached to either, though I knew that to open the door or to take off the corslet meant the incalculable.... In a sense I was not moved by anything. I chose to open, to unbuckle, to loosen the rein. I say, "I chose," yet it did not really seem possible to do the opposite. On the other hand, I was aware of no motives. You could argue that I was not a free agent, but I am more inclined to think that this came nearer to being a perfectly free act than most that I have ever done. Necessity may not be the opposite of freedom, and perhaps a man is most free when, instead of producing motives, he could only say, "I am what I do."

Upon reading this, I wonder if people will - due to the presence of the somewhat magical word "choice" - conclude that this experience is consistent with an Arminian understanding of soteriology, and only with an Arminian understanding. Though experience does not prove theology, it may be that it is consistent with Arminianism; but it is also perfectly consistent with Calvinism. If you don't think so, I submit that you don't really understand Calvinism.

Before I tell why, I think it is necessary to separate classical Calvinism from hyper-Calvinism. (As usual, I don't like the term Calvinism and would prefer to use "monergism"; but I'm starting to be afraid that's a losing battle.) Some people think that somebody who holds to the 5 points is a "hyper-Calvinist" while a real Calvinist is somebody who holds to somewhere between 1 and 4 of them. But that's completely untrue: somebody is a Calvinist/monergist in the classical sense if they hold to all 5 points. So, if the 5 points are not the difference, what is the difference between classical Calvinism and hyper-Calvinism?

I think the best explanation is that classical Calvinism teaches that man does have a will, and that will is involved in his conversion; while hyper-Calvinism teaches that man effectively does not have a will at all, or at least his will is not involved in his conversion. Does this seem a hair-splitting difference? Not at all! This point of Classical Calvinism is probably best explained in Jonathan Edwards' book "The Freedom of the Will." In that book, Edwards explains that man's will, like everything else about us, is subject to sin, is (to use the Biblical terminology) a slave to sin. I love that Biblical word because it is so clear. Slaves aren't slaves because they want to be, but because they are compelled to be. Man's will is controlled by his sin so that it cannot do anything good. Thus, man's unaided will cannot accept God's offer of salvation. (I am aware that the Arminians posit a concept called "prevenient grace" to answer this Biblical truth, but I find no Biblical support for the idea.)

So, in conversion, God does not ignore man's will (as the hyper-Calvinists would teach) but rather converts it, regenerates it, makes it a "new creation." What used to be repugnant to us - giving up our own secret sins and imagined control over our own destinies - is now attractive. Edwards spends a good deal of time explaining how we do what we most want to do and I am not doing justice to his argument. However, the main point is that we do have a will, and when God saves us He converts that will from being a slave to sin to a slave to Jesus Christ.

Getting back to Lewis, it should be clear that his experience is perfectly in sync with what classical Calvinism teaches. He chose, but he felt that it was not possible to do the opposite. Whereas his unregenerate will had previously wanted to "[shut] something out", it now wanted to let that something (or Someone) in. It was a free choice Lewis made; yet he knew at that moment there was only one choice that he wanted to make, and not for any specific reasons he could enumerate. His will had been converted instantaneously from being a slave to sin, and because that conversion had already taken place, he now wanted to follow Christ.

In fact, I'd argue this experience better fits with classical Calvinism than it does with Arminianism. I would think a more consistent Arminian experience would be something like "I had a totally free choice to make; I weighed the pluses and minuses of accepting Christ and decided that I wanted to accept Christ's free offer of eternal life." After all, a free choice in the libertarian free will sense used by most Arminians, involves no necessity of decision; we weigh the pluses and minuses, and freely make whatever decision we want to make at the moment.

How about you? Which of these statements (Lewis's or my made-up one) would you make? I think the answer is clear, if you are truly a Christian: your statement and mine would be something very much like Lewis's. Isn't that telling? I submit that our actual experiences fit better with the classical Calvinist explanation of salvation than the Arminian one; it's only when we start to talk in the abstract that we talk differently.

Again, this does not prove Calvinism is true. As I have said many times before, I think the Bible teaches that clearly enough, and one should never put one's experiences over revealed truth. But I think it has something to say about which soteriological view is more consistent with our actual experiences.

Are you a Red-Letter Christian?

2008-02-19T21:17:00.006-05:00

Have you heard this term? It appears to be basically a term for people self-identifying both as "Christians" and political liberals. There was an excellent article in Christianity Today entitled When Red is Blue, where author Stan Guthrie makes the excellent point that the term "Red-Letter Christian" would better be called "liberal Christian." Well-known "Red Letter Christian" Tony Campolo responded to Guthrie's article - or rather, perhaps I should say he side-stepped Guthrie's article with double-talk saying, is essence, "I agree we'd be better called 'liberal Christians' but we want to pretend it's not true." Where do I get off saying that? Just read Campolo's article on the subject on beliefnet, where he says:

Because being evangelical is usually synonymous with being Republican in the popular mind, and calling ourselves “progressive” might be taken as a value judgment by those who do share our views, we decided not to call ourselves “progressive evangelicals.” We came up with a new name: Red-Letter Christians.

In other words, we're really best called "liberal Christians" but we don't use the term for political reasons. Give me a break.

Anyway, I thought that I would go through Campolo's response to Guthrie's article paragraph-by-paragraph. What I find interesting is that for a really smart guy, Dr. Campolo comes off sounding really dumb. I mean, some of what he says leads me to only one of three conclusions: (1) Dr. Campolo does not know what he's talking about, (2) he's being intentionally deceptive, or (3) his liberal fundamentalism is skewing his thought processes. I don't know which is least flattering. I am well aware that most of Dr. Campolo's audience does not have the theological muscle to understand this; but that makes it no less excusable. Let's look at his response:

I have to say, "You got us right!"

Ok, well at least he admits this.

While we, like you, have a very high view of the inspiration of Scripture and believe the Bible was divinely inspired, you are correct in accusing Red Letter Christians of giving the words of Jesus priority over all other passages of Scripture. What is more, we believe that you really cannot rightly interpret the rest of the Bible without first understanding who Jesus is, what he did, and what he said.

I don't have a problem with giving Jesus's words priority over places where Jesus said He was clarifying. What I have a problem with is your giving your interpretation of Jesus's words a higher priority than the rest of Scripture. Jesus said we should help and serve the poor. Great. I am all for that. Did Jesus say that the government should do it, through stealing money from people under its thumb? No, He told us personally, not the government, that we should take care of the poor.

Now, I understand that your interpretation is that the government, our government, is the one who should take care of the situation. You may feel that government can do it more efficiently than us (although anybody with an understanding of how government normally works would question this, I would think), or some other reason. That may be a valid political position to take, but to claim that Jesus's words force this position is nothing less than a transgression of the third commandment: you are taking your own human interpretation as God's direct command.

In fact, the thing I find especially interesting about this is that this is exactly what these so-called "Red Letter Christians" constantly confuse the rest of us "Black Letter Christians" of doing! Don't they constantly whine that we make God a Republican? What is this other than making God a liberal? (Oops, sorry, I mean, "progressive." :-)

Likewise, we believe the morality in the red letters of Jesus transcends that found in the black letters set down in the Pentateuch, and I'm surprised you don't agree. After all, Stan, didn't Jesus himself make this same point in the Sermon on the Mount, when he said his teachings about marriage and divorce were to replace what Moses taught? Don't you think his red-letter words about loving our enemies and doing good to those who hurt us represent a higher morality than the "eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth" kind of justice that we find in the Hebrew Testament? Is it really so hard to accept that, as God incarnate, Jesus set forth the highest law in the Bible, and therefore that law is more important than the Kosher dietary regulations we find in Leviticus and Deuteronomy?

This paragraph is what really makes me wonder about Dr. Campolo's level of either intelligence, clarity, or veracity. He cannot mean what he seems to be saying here. No, Tony (if I may use your first name), Jesus did not say the same thing. In fact, he specifically said that he came not to abolish the Law or the Prophets ... but to fulfill them" and that "until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished." Jesus certainly does not seem to be abolishing the Pentateuch here. He changed a few things, true: but I think it's clear what's going on, and I am surprised that you don't know this. The things Jesus changed were primarily associated either with the ceremonial law or the government of national Israel.

Paul himself said this (see Colossians 2:16). I would think somebody as smart as Dr. Campolo would understand this. Or do Paul's words not count because they are not shown in red?

What's more, Dr. Campolo's "eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth" statement shows a shocking lack of understanding of the Mosaic law. Any study Bible will inform us that this statement was actually a limitation on the bounds of response to a crime. In fact, it limits the restitution to a response in kind, not the kind of unlimited vengeance that humans take on their own. We could use this kind of limitation in inner cities today, where (one could argue, largely because of the kind of big-government policies favored by Dr. Campolo) it is not unknown to hear of murders based on nothing more than an insult or a stolen pair of shoes, or among organized criminals. An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth would be a great improvement in both of these cases.

You got us RLCs right again when you suggested we were anti-war, pro-environment, and deeply committed to ending poverty primarily because we believe Jesus is anti-war, pro-environment, and deeply committed to ending poverty. The only mistake you made was to imply that thinking this way—or trying to influence our government according to these values—makes us the Religious Left.

Dr. Campolo obviously believes that Jesus was anti-war, pro-environment, and deeply committed to ending poverty. I am not sure which red words exactly tell us the first two, but let's leave that aside. Nobody ever questioned that you are sincere in your beliefs. If fact, I imagine you would give the "Religious Right" you hate the same credit; what you would question is the Right's alleged co-opting of Jesus's words for political ends. And, once again, is this not exactly what you are doing? You say Jesus was anti-war, but don't point out where Jesus's words tell us whether He support this one particular war that you are opposed to so deeply. You assume, without question, that this one war is one that Jesus would oppose. How do you know this? Because it is unwinnable? You'll excuse me if I question your fitness to evaluate this military objective.

You say Jesus is pro-environment; and we would most likely agree. I know of no red words that make this point; but the Pentateuch that you don't give much credence to says that God made the earth, and He made us stewards of it. However, you don't show how Jesus's words support the government taking away our property rights to do it, or how it supports the US government having to give into UN and other international resolutions that are clearly designed to injure the United States as much as to help the environment. You also don't show how Jesus's words support putting specific parts of the environment (say, a threatened forest species) over people's livelihoods.

Finally, you say Jesus was deeply committed to ending poverty. This has two (at least) problems that I would think somebody as smart as Dr. Campolo would understand. First, as pointed out above, why do Jesus's words unequivocally mean that the government should steal from some people and give to others, kind of like a huge, unstoppable, scary Robin Hood? Second, how does he know that we "black letter Christians" do not give our time and resources to helping the poor personally? That seems like a huge guess on Dr. Campolo's part, and one that is uncharitable in the extreme. I give a large part of my income, and a considerable amount of time, helping those who are less materially blessed than I am.

It seems to me that I am the one who is taking Jesus's words truly seriously. Simply allowing the government to do it is using Jesus's words for political gain; letting somebody else take care of the problem (although it's questionable whether the government has in fact ever played a positive part in eradicating poverty) is simply feeling better about yourself by having the government take care of the problem so you don't have to personally. Let's face it, Jesus's words were not spoken (or written down) to governments; they were spoken to us. Yes, we should do what can to help people, to help the environment, to avoid war where possible. But it is a purely political position to state that these things can only be done by government and Jesus had this particular war in mind, and that anybody who opposes your position is setting himself against Jesus's words. You are saying that a transgression against your political position is a transgression against Jesus's words; again, a violation of the third commandment.

That you think asking questions such as, "Do the candidates' budget and tax policies reward the rich or show compassion for poor families?," or "Do the candidates' policies protect the creation or serve corporate interests that damage it?," is partisan saddens us. We believe these are the questions that every Christian should be asking, no matter which political party or candidate has the better answers at a given time in history.

This not only confuses Jesus's words with your interpretation, it is very much along the same lines as political polls that ask questions like "Do you believe the government has the right to steal more of your hard-earned money" instead of a neutral "Do you think the government should raise taxes." The very phrase "reward the rich" is itself a politically loaded statement. It saddens me, Dr. Campolo, that you should be so mired in your political beliefs that you cannot see that. I am well aware, for example, that when I said "the government ... stealing money from people under its thumb" I was using politically charged language. I did that intentionally to counter yours; I would not normally use such biased expressions as these. And I certainly would not use them in an public advertisement such as the Sojourners ad mentioned by Guthrie in his article above.

I'm sorry you don't want to be one of us, Stan. In the struggle to convince our fellow believers to think, act, give, and vote according to the teachings of Jesus, we Red Letter Christians could really use a bright, articulate guy like you.

Sigh. I easily believe that you feel deeply about your struggle to convince your fellow believers that Jesus's words support your chosen political position. How is this not co-opting Jesus's words as you constantly accuse the "Religious Right" of doing?

In summary, Dr. Campolo, I'm sorry you don't want to be one of us Black Letter Christians. (One might simply say "Christians" but that would be unfairly critical; I certainly cannot judge his heart.) In the struggle to convince our fellow believers to take the teachings of Jesus and indeed the rest of the Bible seriously (and not mistake their political positions for the only possible interpretation of Jesus's teachings), we Black Letter Christians could really use a bright, articulate, committed, and energetic guy like you. Won't you join us?

A personal note about Arminians and Calvinists

2008-01-22T22:31:00.001-05:00

Reading over this blog, one might think one of several things about me. First, that I am obsessed with Arminians. Second, that I have a hate or disrespect for them. Neither of these can be farther from the truth.

Christ prayed that we (believers) would all be one. But this cannot mean agreeing all of the time. Heck, whatever we do we will not agree all the time. Perhaps Christ only meant agree all the time on spiritual things, that our oneness only extends when we are talking about "religion"? So might say my Catholic friends. But I see no such limitation in the text. And, as somebody has said, dividing things into the sacred and the profane is not a valid division. Holy and unholy, yes - pretty much everything in our lives is either done to the glory of God, or done against Him and His glory and will. Hard to imagine, but we are living on that (to pull in C. S. Lewis's quote) razor's edge every minute of our lives. But not sacred and profane. The most "sacred" thing in the world can be done in the most unholy manner (for example, in clown-led worship services); while the most "profane" can be done in the holiest manner (when I do something for somebody not because I want to or particularly feel good around it, but because I think God wants me to).

So, Christ prayed that we be one; but that obviously will not mean that we are all one of the same opinion. I think it must mean that we would be one in the sense that we loved one another and wanted the best for each other, and that we are working for the same overall goal. Namely, working for Christ's kingdom, for God's glory, etc. In fact, I think it means much the same as when man and wife are called to be "one." Anybody who ever thought that means "having the same opinions on every, or even, any subject" has obviously not been married. :-)

So, the fact that I take a different interpretation of Biblical passages does not, in itself, mean that I am not "being one" with my Arminians brothers and sisters in Christ. I should note, of course, that I am speaking solely of oneness with other believers; oneness with unbelievers is (as we say here in The South) a whole 'nother subject. But, as to believers, I can be "one" with them even if I hold a widely different theology than them.

One might object that we can hold different opinions on theology, but I should not talk about them. Thus, the fact that I disagree with Arminians is ok in itself; but I should not be talking about it here on the blog. That seems to me wrong on three counts. First, as long as I do it in a respectful manner - which I attempt to do - what is the problem? If you read my postings, I think you will note that I attempt to fairly portray both sides of the argument, even bringing up objections that a reader may never have thought of. In fact, I am intentionally not bringing up the kind of ridiculous strawmen often brought up by people of other theological stripes. For example, I have no desire to think of an analog to the infamous Bus Stop Analogy, or to present seriously a counter to John Wesley's statement about Calvinism stopping one from evangelizing. No doubt with free time on one's hands, a Calvinist could think up devastating-sounding equivalents that hit on Arminians. But what would be the purpose of that, except to dissuade people from being Arminians but not actually letting them consider the issues? How would God be glorified that way? If monergism is true (which I believe it is), we should not be afraid to confront the actual Biblical text; Bus Stop Analogies and clever but misguided redefinitions of words (like "Elected because I selected") are not only a waste of time, but disrespectful and thus unloving. It is these kinds of analogs and "arguments" that truly reflect a lack of "oneness."

The second reason it is wrong is like unto the first: because there is so much disinformation out there regarding Arminianism and Calvinism. See the examples above. It seems to me that some kind of antidote is called for; if I can play some small part in administering that antidote, all the glory goes to God.

Finally, there are a number of people around who claim to disdain both Calvinism and Arminian, to be "Biblicists" in place of those types of labels. If they are talking about Calvinism per se - following in lock step the teachings of Calvin - then I agree with them that Calvinism can divide people unnecessarily. (Curious how these types of people never seem to be that concerned that Arminianism divides people just as much as Calvinism.) In fact, the whole so-called "Calminian" point of view - which also divides people, I should note - deserves another post. For the time being, I should say that as long as there are folks out there claiming to be "Calminians" or "moderate Calvinists" but in reality being no such thing, an antidote is called for. Not to knock them down a notch - that is not at all my purpose. Rather, hopefully to help them think about some things they've not considered, rejected out-of-hand because of some presupposition.

As to the question of whether I have a hate or disrespect for Arminians, I have to meet this suspicion with straight denials. To borrow the old phrase, "some of my best friends are Arminians." This is totally true. Some of the men and women whom I most respect and love are Arminians and would disagree with me strongly on much of what I've written here. But that does not diminish by one iota my love and respect for these people. Most of them are better people than I will likely ever be; the best of them have a certain quality about them that is only describable as "holiness." My pastor, for instance, has a holiness about him and his entire family that I despair of ever matching. He is not holier than I wish to be, of course - but I have many years of bad habits lamentably built up in my life, and bad habits, repeated for 20 years, die hard. That's an explanation, not an excuse.

What's more, some Arminians - not all, of course - are far more evangelistic in their actions than I am. I am thinking of a certain associate pastor at our church who will share the gospel with absolutely anybody. I am asking God to change me, to help me be more like that; to be bolder about sharing the gospel. As well, I am studying evangelism training such as Way of the Master. Most Arminians, of course, do not have this kind of fervor (just as most Calvinists don't); but some do, and I love and respect them for it.

So, I pray to be like the best of them in holiness and in love for the lost and action to help unbelievers get to the point of saving faith in Christ. But that does not mean that I have to agree with them, just as it does not mean they have to agree with me.

Arminians don't pray for people's salvation

2008-01-18T13:50:00.001-05:00

In the tradition of my previous Outrageously Untrue Assertions (Arminians don't evangelize! and Calvinists don't evangelize!), I present my latest outrageously untrue assertion: Arminians don't pray for the salvation of other people. In other words, following in the tradition of those misunderstandings, I want to fill another posting with a new set of misunderstandings for your consideration.

Before properly rejecting it as obviously untrue, let's follow the philosophical path taken by most of those who say "Calvinism kills evangelism" and consider the merits of my assertion. Just like Calvinists, Arminians believe that God wants to save everybody in some sense, but that there is another consideration that overrides His acting on that desire and saving everybody. Calvinists would say that consideration is His glory, which can only be fully displayed in both His wrath and His mercy. It is my understanding that Arminians, on the other hand, generally believe that consideration is God's respect of our free will. (At least, that's what I would have said when I was among their honorable ranks.) C. S. Lewis said that God did not want to create an army of puppets; that, to quote the Free Will Song, "only willing love is worth the price." Thus, God cannot save everybody, though He wants to, because He wants more to respect our free will. That's His higher will that overrides His will that all be saved, just as Calvinists say that God's higher will that His glory be increased overrides His will that all be saved.

Let's see how the Arminian understanding plays out in the question of whether we should pray for our unsaved friends and relatives. First, logically, it means that we can't make a request of God to override the person's free will; we can't say "Lord, change his/her heart," because that would be against what we understand his will to be. We know that "praying in Jesus's name" cannot mean praying for something that we know is against His will; thus, following the idea that God's highest will is to respect our free will, we can't pray for God to save somebody.

I should note that some people may object that prayer is not simply making supplication; there are other sorts of prayer that are simply "communing" with God, thanking God, praising Him, etc. I would certainly agree with that, but I don't think that's what people actually do when they are praying for somebody else's salvation. I don't think they simply say "O God, thank you for your greatness in saving me and for your greatness in respecting X's free will." That's a valid prayer (and perhaps the kind worth praying more often), but it is not praying for the other person's salvation, so I don't think that's the way most pray. Certainly, that's not what they've done in my presence.

So, the best we can pray for given that understanding of God's will - and this is what I often tried to do when I was an Arminian myself - is that God will do His will in the situation, whatever that may be. That, too, seems unsatisfying. We have such a love for our unsaved family and friends, such a desire to see them saved by God as we know that we have been saved by Him - for who among us would have the temerity to boast that it was thanks to our own free choice that we accepted God's saving grace? - that we cannot help wanting to pray for the person's salvation. Sure, we want God's will in every situation; but, like David in many Psalms, cannot help crying out our desire for God's intervention. So, how can we pray?

What if we pray for God to change the circumstances of the person's life so that he will accept the Gospel? Surely we can pray for God to change those, so the person will then accept God of his own free will. At least, that's the kind of conclusion that I drew when I was an Arminian myself, and often prayed that way. However, let's consider that answer in the full light of our libertarian free will assumption. It seems like the circumstances around the person that God might change might be of two types: the people around him, and the inanimate objects and situations around him. Let's consider each in turn.

If the circumstances that need changing are other people around him, them what about their free will? If God so respects free will, He needs to respect their free will also. Does God only respect the free will of people He foresees as coming to faith in him in faith and thus making themselves part of the elect? And what verse does that come from?
On the other hand, if the circumstances only include purely inanimate objects, isn't God bribing the person? Isn't this like saying either "you are free to love me or not; ignore this million dollars I'm holding in front of you" or "you are free to love me or not, pay no attention to the gun I'm holding to your head"? Either way, positively or negatively, God is coercing the person's will; and if "only willing love is worth the price," that kind of coerced love is not "willing" in any important sense I can think of.

The fact is, my mind cannot conceive of any way that God could influence the person to accept salvation without somehow violating their assumed libertarian free will. God could only love the person and hope for the best, so to speak; any positive action on His part would be violating what is said to be His highest will. Thus, it seems to me that a consistent Arminian would not pray for other people's salvation; the best they could do is pray that God's will be done, whether it's to save or damn the person.

However, unlike some who take a misunderstood understanding of unconditional election and assume that therefore Calvinists don't evangelize, I do not reach the conclusion that actual Arminians don't pray for their friends' and family's salvation. To their credit, most Arminians do not follow their philosophy to this logical end. They pray for their friends and loved ones with fervor, asking God to change their hearts. I have heard it myself; I prayed it myself (thought not as sincerely, no doubt, as many) when I was in more or less the same state of mind and emotions.

So, what is my point? Just the same as my other Outrageously Untrue Assertions: that you cannot take a understanding of somebody's philosophy and assume that they act on that philosophy the way you think they will. And that for two reasons:

First, they may not act consistently with their philosophy: it was C. S. Lewis who said that he would rather play cards with a man who had doubts about ultimate questions of right and wrong but who had been raised with the understanding that "gentlemen do not cheat" than with an impeccable moral philosopher who had been raised by card sharps. People often don't act consistently with their philosophy, and I am extremely grateful for that. Otherwise atheists would be following their assumed "law of the survival of the fittest," whose primary duty - if one is to improve the human race's condition - would have to be to ruthlessly conquer everything in sight. In other words, even if it were true that Calvinism per se discouraged evangelism - which I am far from granting - you cannot assume that any given Calvinist will disdain evangelism themselves.
Second, your understanding of that philosophy may be faulty. My understanding of Arminian philosophy may be faulty, I don't know; one is perhaps a poor judge of one's own positions on things. However, I can say for sure that the vast majority of Arminians I have talked to and listened to misunderstand Calvinist theology. Many hear things that don't exist ("The doctrine of Unconditional Election means there's no reason to evangelize") and ignore things that do ("What do you mean God wants all to be saved? So why doesn't He save them?")

One of these may be true, or both; either way, it's unwise to make pronouncements on how people will act based on what you think their philosophy teaches.

Calvinists and Arminians in a hole

2008-01-14T09:08:00.000-05:00

I thought it would be interesting to share a little analogy I used to describe the different kinds of Christian soteriologies to my son. Let me tell you a story about a man in a hole in the ground. He's in the hole partly because he was born there (for his mother and father also lived in the hole, and in fact they were born there as well), but also partly because he enjoys it down there. Sure, it's inconvenient sometimes; and sometimes it's embarrassing. A person in a hole does not generally enjoy being seen by other people in that state, even other people who are in the hole themselves. It's true, there are some other people in the hole that the man is proud to be seen in the hole with: he even sometimes exaggerates the depth of his own hole to seem "bigger" or "cooler" in the eyes of the other people in the hole.

However, he knows deep inside that he was not made for that hole; that there's a loving Person right outside the hole, who wants him out of the hole to live alongside Him in the light. So, in his better moments - which are fleeting and only there in the first place because the Person outside gives them to him anyway - he wants to leave the hole. Not that he wants to yield his rights to the hole and follow the Person outside, or even to have his filth fully examined in the dreadful light of day: he has no desire to do that. It's simply that sometimes the inconveniences of being in the hole makes him wish to be outside it. How does the man in the hole understand how he might be saved? It all depends on his theology:

The Pelagian says that the Person outside is just standing there, waiting for him to come out. It's up to him to claw his way up out of the hole using any means at his disposal (good works, morality, etc.) But, of course, the hole is far too deep for that, so again and again makes it a little way up the wall, but always falls back to the bottom again.
The Semi-Pelagian says that the Person outside will reach down and grab him, but only after he crawls most of the way out of the hole himself. The Person outside wants to save him, but the problem is that His arms are just not long enough to reach down and grab him. So, he tries to claw his way up far enough so the Person outside can reach him, but unfortunately can't make it that far. He too falls back down into the hole.
The Arminian says that the Person outside can in fact reach down and grab him and save him, but has too much respect for the man's desire to stay in the hole to do it. Therefore, He reaches down and holds His hands out, but doesn't grab him; He dangles His hands mere inches above the man's nose. But the man does not really want to accept help from the Person. Being lifted out of that hole would mean surrendering all his pride; and he simply - at his better moments - wants to be outside the hole. There's such a thing as getting more than you bargained for! So he does not grab onto the Person's hand.

However, the Person sometimes inexplicably stops respecting the man's free will and change the circumstances of the man's life - alters the other people and things in the hole - so the man then wants to grab onto the Person's hand and be saved. The man's a little fuzzy on how changing the people around him is not violating their free wills; but he's thankful that the Person did it. Unfortunately, once he's on the surface, the Person still lets him have his unregenerated free will, so if he's not very careful, he'll decide the hole really was not that bad, and slip back down into it, necessitating that the whole process starts over again.
The Calvinist believes that the Person can reach down and grab the man. However, the Person will not grab the man as long as the man still desires to be down there, as long as he still does not want to surrender his hole to the Person. But thankfully, since the Person outside the hole made the man, He knows the man's desires, and is able to change them. This should not be shocking: He generated the man and his desires in the first place, so why can't He re-generate them now? So, the Person reaches down, and changes the man's desires; once the Person does this, the man reaches up and grabs the hand of the Person reaching down for him. The man is pulled up, not with any merit of his own, not even that he made the Right Decision and chose to be saved; only thankful that the Person outside changed him from the inside out.

The man is slightly troubled by one problem, however: the Person outside does not save everybody from their holes, when clearly He could. However, the man realizes two things. First, the Person is respecting their free wills and leaving them in their holes - because that is where they truly desire to be. Sure, they complain sometimes, but given the alternative (living a life with their desires for the hole surrendered to the Person) is even less desirable: the hole is the lesser of the two evils in their minds. Second, the man realizes that there may be some reason for the Person to leave people in their own holes that he may not grasp 100%. And he is not shocked by this. After all, down in the hole, the man knows that his thinking is futile and his foolish heart is darkened. The Person outside is not only much wiser, but His own thinking is not futile. Certainly part of the reason why the Person does not save everybody - though in one sense He certainly desires to do so - is that He wishes to demonstrate His justice as well as His mercy. But, beyond that, the Person obviously has other reasons that the man will not fully know until he is living in the ultimate light of day with the Person.

The man simply accepts that, thankful that the Person has chosen to pull him from his hole.

You'll note that I did not say anything about what I've called semi-Calvinists or semi-Arminians, those who usually call themselves "moderate Calvinists" or "Calminians." This is because I am increasingly coming to believe that they do not actually exist. But that will take another article to explain.

Contrary to popular belief ...

2008-01-04T21:56:00.000-05:00

Not an Idiot Congratulations, you are not an idiot. You passed the test, which means you're smarter than most of the people who come to this site. Give yourself a great big pat on the back. Then, go find someone who IS an idiot, and make fun of them.

And you had your doubts ...

Arminians don't evangelize!

2007-12-19T20:55:00.000-05:00

Ok, so that's a provocative title. And it's probably the first time in history that anybody has ever used that phrase. (Google turns up no hits on it: guess I'll be the first!) However, I'd like to discuss the merits of this phrase versus the common refrain that Calvinists don't evangelize. I believe it was Wesley (cite, anybody?) who said that if Calvinism was true, there would be no reason to evangelize. If the quote is authentic, it shows me one thing only: Wesley knew very little about Calvinism, despite having been brought up on Calvinist doctrine. (That should not be surprising: how many today would call themselves Calvinists because they were brought up in the Presbyterian church, perhaps are even Presbyterian pastors; but could not give any substantive doctrinal differences between the 5 points of Calvinism vs. the 5 points of the Remonstrants? Or describe the key difference between monergism and synergism, and why it's illogical to cling to "once saved, always saved" and still be a synergist?)

However, I don't want to talk about Wesley. What I'd like to do is discuss on what basis a person would come to the strongly-held belief that either Calvinists, Arminians, or any other group don't evangelize, and whether Calvinists have just as strong a claim to say Arminians don't, as the other way around.

It seems to me that you can make the claim that any group of Christians (Calvinists, Arminians, Pentacostals, etc.) don't evangelize on one of three grounds. First, the experiential: who do you actually know who subscribes to the doctrine, and do they share the gospel with others? Second, the historical: have members of that group historically been evangelistic? Third, the philosophical: does the doctrine tend to discourage evangelism? All three of them have faults. Let's consider them in turn.

First, the experiential argument. Think for a second of other Christians you know. Then ask yourself two questions: (1) Do you really know where they stand doctrinally? (2) Do you really know whether or not they share their faith? I think you will find that you probably come out, as I did, rather poorly in both of these areas. First, I seriously doubt that you really know what most of their doctrinal beliefs are. There are beliefs of every stripe in every kind of church. I attend a Calvary Chapel, which I've noted before as being well-known for its anti-Calvinism; yet I know a number of monergists that attend there. We are pretty quiet most of the time, but we are here nonetheless. But in addition, I doubt you really know whether most of them share their faith. I have fairly recently (past year or so) become more convicted about sharing my own faith, so I purchased the Way of the Master video series and I am now leading a small group in this series. One of the assignments was to call some Christian friends and ask them whether they shared their faith. I was, frankly, very surprised at their responses. The wife, very outgoing and friendly (and strong in her faith as well) said she rarely did. The husband, on the other hand, is very, very quiet: yet he said that he shared his faith all the time, even seeking out strangers. (I believe he has monergist leanings as well.) I would bet most people have the same lack of understanding of their friends doctrines and evangelistic fervor.

So, the question next turns to the historical. This is even trickier, because the vast majority of people in the past we have no access to. All we know is the well known preachers and writers. And I submit that many of them in the past: Whitefield, Spurgeon, and Edwards, to name three, were both Calvinist and evangelistic. Even if it were true that there were more Arminians in the past who were evangelistic, that would have little bearing on whether it was the monergism itself that tended to produce less evangelistic fervor or some other factor. (Relationships, other philosophies, etc.) One might also compare against these against non-Christian groups (e.g. Mormons) and both Calvinists and Arminians would fare rather poorly in comparison, evangelistically-speaking.

Finally, we turn to the philosophical. I find, in practice, that most people who have used a variant of "Calvinism destroys evangelism" with me are basing their belief on the philosophical ground that the doctrine of election makes it useless to evangelize. I have argued elsewhere on this blog, of course, that this is a specious argument: but I will have to keep fighting this battle for a long time to come. However, the title of this blog is not "Calvinists don't evangelize", but rather "Arminians don't evangelize." And, following my many synergist friends, I want to put forth primarily the philosophical argument, because as I have pointed out, I know so little about other people's evangelistic efforts in the present or the past.

Now, the philosophical basis is dangerous too, because I've found that it's dangerous to assume you know how somebody acts based on his philosophy. I know atheists who are kind and loving even though logically their philosophy (some variant of "survival of the fittest") should dictate they should not be.

Nevertheless, let's consider how the typical Arminian sees God's foreknowledge. We all believe that God knows "the end from the beginning," and that He "elects" us in some sense. The most logical way these could be true, of course, is if He's ordaining them; but let's take the synergistic tack here. Let's say that God's looking down that "corridor of time" to see who will believe in Him, and electing them on that basis. Now, let's say that God foresees that some time in the future a given person will believe. Since God is perfect, He must have perfect knowledge of the situation, right? So, if God sees that the person will believe, why should I bother sharing the Gospel with him? God knows who will believe in him; if I don't share the Gospel with him, obviously somebody else will (since God has already seen that it will happen). Bingo! I'm off the hook!

Let's say, on the other hand, that God sees that the person will not believe. In that case, there's still no point in sharing the Gospel, right? No matter what I do, God has already seen with His perfect knowledge and flawless vision down that big "corridor of time" that the person will not believe. Again, why should I then bother sharing the Gospel with him? In fact, it seems to me that Calvinists and Arminians are in the exact same boat here. Either way, what the person will do is foreknown by God. In either case, one could argue there's no reason to share the Gospel with anybody. In fact, using this logic, the only people who would ever share the Gospel are Open Theists, those who believe that God does not know the things to come. They reject the "corridor of time"; and thus, they might argue, they need to share the Gospel because the future of the person cannot be known by anybody, either us or God.

At this point, an Arminian may demur and bring up the point that there are other reasons why he shares the Gospel, such as the following:

God may have access to that "corridor" and know who will believe in Him, but we don't.
We were told to share the Gospel in the Great Commandment, and it doesn't matter whether the person will ultimately believe or not. Therefore we need to share the Gospel with every man.
Even if God can see that down His "corridor of time" that the person will not believe, being told the truth of the Gospel will make his eventual lot in hell worse, and rightly so.

And I would agree with him. However, one could make the point - and I have in other posts - that these exact same reasons can be used by Calvinists:

God may know who His elect are, but we don't.
We were told to share the Gospel in the Great Commandment, and it doesn't matter whether the person is ultimately saved or not. Therefore we need to share the Gospel with every man.
Even if God has not sovereignly chosen to save that person from the condemnation he rightly deserves and even desires, being told the truth of the Gospel will make his eventual lot in hell worse, and rightly so.

So, you can't have it both ways. Either you believe that both Calvinism and Arminianism discourage evangelism (and become some form of Open Theist, whether the Christian variety, Jehovah's Witness, Muslim, whatever), or you give up on the old saw that Calvinists don't evangelize.

Postscript: I should note that none of this says anything about whether monergism or synergism is actually the true description of God's redemptive plan. After all, two of the most evangelistic groups today, with more evangelism per capita than either Arminians or Calvinists, are the Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses. They are evangelizing to a false gospel, but they certainly have fervor.

How I got where I am, theologically (part two)

2007-12-18T20:45:00.001-05:00

Last time (you might want to read that article first), I talked about my pre-Christian life. In this installment I want to describe my life as a follower of Christ. As I said previously, after the birth of our son, we joined a very liberal Episcopal church. How much so? Well, the associate rector (a woman who seemed more interested in fighting "fundamentalism" and taking part in AIDS marches than evangelism) unequivocally told me that the Bible was NOT the word of God; while the rector (a man, an extremely nice and avuncular fellow who I believe was saved himself yet tragically deceived) told me that he and I disagreed on the issue of ordination of practicing homosexuals because I "believe[d] in following what the Bible says." Yet, even in that church, there was a believing remnant; I played on the worship team with one such woman. God has His people all around.

Anyway, while in one sense it was the worst place we could have been, in another sense it was one of the best. Because, when I started to be really convicted by the Holy Spirit, and even at that point I realized that I could not turn to the church leadership for spiritual guidance, I called upon my soon-to-be old friend and now fellow Anglican C. S. Lewis. I found the books that my old friend Lee Braddock had given me several years earlier, dusted them off, and started reading: and was instantly convicted not only of the logical sense of Christianity, but also of its rightness. In a flash, Christianity seemed to me the right thing; not just right because it made me happy or made sense, but ultimately and finally Right. This is one of the many reasons why I believe in the monergistic ("Calvinistic," if you prefer) view of salvation: shortly before, I not only had no interest nor desire for the things of a Christian God; they seemed (to my Unitarian-leaning mind) not just illogical but totally wrong, a violation of the universe. Now, they were ultimately Right. I was devouring C. S. Lewis books and intensely interested in learning more and more. Against my will, I was converted, and (in accordance with what monergism teaches), it instantly became my will.

At first we all become followers of our teachers, and thus, following C. S. Lewis (a pretty pure Arminian if ever there was one), I became an Arminian believer in Jesus Christ. What Lewis wrote about God not foreseeing our belief, but rather just seeing it made some sense to me. It was about this time I first heard the sorry "Corridor of Time" analogy: "God looks down that corridor of time and discovers who will believe in Him, and thus He elects them." That analogy made little sense to me even at that time (for reasons I will note below), but the Lewis analogy of God being above time as we might be above a piece of paper and look down at the squiggles on the paper made at least some sense. I was still bothered somewhat - after all, didn't God make the paper, too? - but I was satisfied for the time being. I bought wholeheartedly Lewis's rejection of Total Depravity and his argument about God not wanting to create armies of puppets (and thus libertarian free will was mandatory).

After about a year at the Episcopal church, I knew we had to leave. The end finally came when I realized that the church would be teaching my kids things radically opposed to what I believed to be the truth. So I started looking for another church, and quickly found a solid, Bible-teaching church pastored by a graduate of Dallas Seminary. Again, my beliefs changed somewhat: I became a pre-tribulational, "Calminian" (which term I will write about soon) in the mold of Dallas Seminary and Lewis Sperry Chafer. This was clearly, to my maturing Christian mind, much closer to the truth. The Bible was held up as the standard of belief (rather than feelings and uninspired pure reason).

Then, I came upon a book that would change my beliefs forever: "The Gospel According to Jesus" by John MacArthur. (Books have played quite a part in my spiritual journey, haven't they?) In it, MacArthur made a convincing argument - both practical and Biblical - against the "easy-believism" or "anti-Lordship salvation" message taught largely by Dallas Seminary graduates. It made total sense to me, the same way Lewis had made in my initial conversion. Why would God allow people to be saved, only to live the exact lifestyle they had always lived? I read all the anti-Lordship arguments: about how "repentance" in the Greek really just meant "changing your mind." That seemed woefully inadequate. Clearly, if God had a purpose in salvation (which He surely does), He not only wants us to change, but He Himself will empower us to change (though His Holy Spirit). I was still primarily a believer in decisional regeneration - make a decision to believe, and you're in - but it was clear the anti-Lordship view took that way too far. What I didn't realize, of course, is that anti-Lordship is the logical consequent of decisional regeneration: if I make the decision, I'm saved, no matter how I live my life. But, again, I was happy, and more mature in Christ. I also, following Dallas Seminary teachings, was a believer in "once saved, always saved." Now, even at that time, it didn't make total sense to me - if I made the decision to believe, why can't I make the decision to "unbelieve"? - but, again, I left that as something to learn on another day.

We spent the next 7 years at that church, generally learning and growing as a Christian. Almost three years ago, for various reasons we switched to Cornerstone Chapel, where we now attend. And, the more I learned and read, the more the "Calminian" position I espoused started bothering me. The anti-Calvinist position of Calvary Chapel was actually a great help, because it brought my discomfort into clearer focus. First, what about that decision thing? Why can't I decide to unbelieve? Along with that was the whole idea of libertarian free will and the belief (which I had inherited from C. S. Lewis) that God had to give His creatures free will because He respected our freely-given love so much. What bothered me was this: if God is so intensely interested in giving me free will to believe or not, why is it, once I believe, that He takes my free will away from me? In other words, if I have the free will to accept or reject Him before I'm saved, then why do I not have that free will after I'm saved?

At the same time, I was becoming increasingly troubled by the famous "Corridor of Time" or Lewis's example of God looking down on His creation from outside time like we'd look down at a piece of paper, like some 3-dimensional visitor to Flatland. (I should mention that, though Flatland has no specific religious aspect, and in fact is quite anti-authoritarian, it too played a part in opening my mind up to the possibility that God might intrude into my nice, neat, atheist / materialist world.) My troubles were three. First, let's say that God is not determining my future; rather, my future is laid out on that piece of paper or corridor. But didn't God make the piece of paper/corridor? If so, how can it be that He is not in control of it but simply observing it? This seemed to me to imply that God is somehow subservient or at least co-equal to the corridor or paper; an idea which is right at home in the pantheon of Greek gods or even in Flatland (where the sphere did not control the flat plane, and in fact was bothered by the concept of 4-dimensional beings when the hero of the book brought it up) but not in Christianity. Second, if God can look down the corridor and see what I'm going to do, I still have no free will. My future is determined, not by God, but by the corridor; it only looks to me like I have free will. (I once had a discussion with a very intelligent and caring agnostic who brought up this same point.) This was unacceptable; for one thing, I'd far rather depend on a loving, perfect, and righteous Father God to determine my salvation than some impersonal corridor or sheet of paper. Finally, I saw no Biblical support for the corridor or paper: they may be interesting analogies, but when I looked to the Bible for support, I found none.

Finally, one more problem that came to mind was the adoption metaphor used in Scripture. I had been looking at particular proof-texts and ignoring the overall tone or message; as C.S. Lewis said in another context, claiming to see fern-seed but unable to discern an elephant in broad daylight. The adoption metaphor hit me when I realized that I was taking the typical "Calminian" view that, though I was eternally secure in the sense that God would never cast me out through my sin, I could get myself kicked out of heaven through unbelief. But my whole viewpoint changed after we adopted our daughter. What, I thought, could Danning ever do to get kicked out of the family? Could her simple unbelief in our authority, or even active opposition to us? No! She would still be our daughter forever, and I'd be doing everything I could to bring her back into a right relationship. But, if the Calminian view was right, she could get herself "unadopted" from us. I would never unadopt her, I thought: so how could God, far more loving than I, do it?

So, I read more, trying to make sense of everything I was reading in the Bible. Finally, thanks to radio broadcasts by the Bible Answer Man, I heard Dr. James White and finally realized that monergism was the answer to what was troubling me, theologically speaking. It was Biblically supported; it made sense; it was rational; it was emotionally satisfying; it was - if you understand it rightly and not caricature it - just. Now, I am not a mindless follower of Dr. White: I still disagree with some of the things he says, including some of what he has said about Calvary Chapel. But again, my mind was opened to the truth. Everything I had read in the Bible suddenly made sense. It wasn't MY decision for God that made me a Christian, it was HIS decision for me: and God doesn't change His mind or make wrong decisions. I was no longer depending on the Corridor of Time for God to make a right judgment of my belief or unbelief: I now knew that God will make the right decision, far better than I ever could. Finally, I didn't have to worry about why I could possibly believe in eternal security: once God adopts you into His family, you're there forever.

Does monergism answer all the questions? No. I still don't understand how we can have free will in any sense at all with God knowing and foreordaining the future. (Nor do I understand how I would have free will with God simply seeing and not foreordaining the future as my Arminian friends teach: a fact my agnostic friend quickly and ably pointed out to me.) But, though not understanding totally, I believe in monergism because the Bible teaches it, just as I believe in the Trinity because the Bible teaches it without totally understanding it. Really, though, it should not be surprising to us that God can understand things we cannot. After all, let's say I someday have the privilege of meeting Steven Hawking. Pretty much anything he would say would leave me totally confused. Does this mean I disbelieve him? No! My logical conclusion would be that because he's so much smarter than I am, he probably understands a lot more than I; and I'd assume that if I was as smart as him, I'd most likely agree with him.

If that's so, how much more true is it with God, not only infinite intelligent, but also infinitely wise, and not chained down by sin as we are, His understanding and judgments undarkened by sin? I can't begin to understand how He spoke and the universe instantaneously leapt into existence ex nihilo; so how can I fully understand His plan of salvation and interaction between His knowledge and will and ours? If God's plan and working could be totally comprehended (the Latin word, appropriately, means to grasp and totally take under control), God would be no greater than I. And that would be truly wrong.

That is where I stand now. I know I don't have all the answers. But I do know that I must tell the truth as I currently understand it, as I continue to grow and mature as a Christian, and with God's help working out His plan for my life, I will learn more and become closer to God and His understanding. I pray the same for you.

How I got where I am, theologically (part one)

2007-12-18T11:46:00.001-05:00

I thought it might be useful to describe my own spiritual journey, in case it might be interesting or useful to somebody. I grew up in the Roman Catholic church, a "cradle Catholic." My mom also grew up a cradle Catholic, while my dad joined the church when they got married. Overall, we were very involved in the church: my family going to church every Sunday, my brothers and I going to CCD, at least until we were old enough to object sufficiently forcefully for our parents to let us stop. (Note for those who did not grow up Catholic: CCD is the Catholic equivalent to going to Sunday School. It stands for "Confraternity of Christian Doctrine," which I did not know until I googled it just now. We just always called it "CCD." Actually, I always thought it stood for "Catholic Christian Doctrine," which sounded right in my mind but looked really silly when I typed it.) My dad was an usher, and he "ushed" (as we called it) frequently. I also attended Catholic school from first to third grade, and had the experience of being in Sister Thomas Marguerite's class at Our Lady of Good Counsel school.

Overall, I was a pretty pious youngster: I got in trouble from time to time (including once conspiring with my middle brother to give our youngest brother a swirlie), but wanted to be a priest when I grew up. As my brother and I were altar boys, that seemed the logical next step. I went through all the normal sacraments - including being confirmed at age 13 with the confirmation name of "John." I was bummed because I wanted to pick a new name, like "Pious" or "Felix," but they said I should use my middle name. I'm still not sure what that bit about the name change is, maybe it's supposed to be like Saul to Paul or Jacob to Israel.

Needless to say, I was never a Christian during this time. Like most cradle Catholics (and increasingly but not surprisingly, increasingly many evangelical youths), I dropped away from Christianity in my teens. At college, I made a few attempts at going to church, but overall I derived more benefit from sleeping in on Sunday mornings after Saturday's party than sitting in church. As time went on, I started to doubt the existence of God. The behavior of some so-called "Christians" was a big part of it: I remember one guy who claimed to be a Christian, but was also a big drinker, and definitely was the biggest womanizer I knew: it was said that he could get any girl to bed on the first night, and as far as I knew that was the truth. I wasn't a Christian, of course, but even I knew that wasn't how a Christian ought to act. (I should mention that one of my own personal mission fields is Yahoo! Answers, and I can respond to many of the objectors to Christianity because, frankly, I've heard and thought it all before, and come through the other side when rationality took over instead of emotion.)

Over the next 15 years, I went through various stages of unbelief. Sometimes I would have considered myself an all-out atheist, saying the idea of a god was simplistic and for people who preferred easy, black-and-white answers to reality. Sometimes I would have just been considered an agnostic: sure, it's obvious that God exists, but nobody could ever know anything about Him, and He's certainly not the God of Christianity. (Isn't it nice how sure of things you can be when you say you can't be sure about anything? ) Other times, I really tried to be a Zen Buddhist. I read koans, attempted Zazen (aka "sitting"), read books like Lawrence LeShan's "How to Meditate." It seemed obscure, other worldly, incomprehensible: just like what I thought religion ought to be, and so different from the cut-and-dried "Christianity" I had believed in as a kid with the big old man in the sky, white beard, and all that.

Then, a guy with the good all-Virginian name of Lee Braddock witnessed to me. (He was the guy I mentioned in my article on Cursing Christians, who softly responded "that's kind of disgusting if you think about it" to my oh-so-clever vulgarism.) He gave me the C. S. Lewis books "Mere Christianity" and "The Problem of Pain," which I leafed through a bit but pretty much ignored at the time, but which had a huge impact on me later.

I ignored Christianity for the next 6 years (getting more intensely into studying Buddhism), when a force to be reckoned with came crashing on my neat little unbelieving world: my son JA. Seeing him, I instantly knew there was more to the world than I had been believing. The philosophies of the world (along with the liberal politics I had been imbibing) started seemingly increasingly wrong. Looking back, I was clearly under conviction by the Holy Spirit: at the time, all I knew was that I felt vaguely but unceasingly uneasy.

When JA was about a year old, Marcia made it clear she wanted us to go to church. I suggested trying to find a Buddhist temple (which she put the kibosh on), as well as trying to find a Unitarian church in the area. Unitarians are a very liberal (theologically and politically) group who we had attended a few years earlier. Thankfully, there were no nearby Unitarian Universalist congregations, or I might have wanted to join them. (Not that that would have stopped God from regenerating my heart, of course: but my life would have just been more difficult had I not yielded when I did.) So, lacking a Unitarian group to join, we picked the Episcopal church in town. This was a good choice, I thought, because it joined the two things I wanted most in a church: the same kind of traditions I had remembered from growing up ("smells and bells," the assistant rector of that church called it), and very liberal politics. However, even there, there were Christians. My face-to-face encounter with God had begun.

TO BE CONTINUED (don't you hate it when people do that?) ...

Striking a balance on Calvary Chapel - the not-so-good

2007-10-17T16:22:00.001-04:00

In my first article - which you should read before reading this one - I gave what I thought were the good points about Calvary Chapel. In short, I very much appreciate their commitment to teaching the Bible in everything they do. I also appreciate their evangelistic and community focus. However, I do not agree with everything Calvary Chapel teaches. Consider this not so much as the "bad" as what is, I believe, the "not perfect." (There is no perfect church, of course; they're all made of imperfect people - like myself.)

For one thing, as I believe monergism best describes the teachings of the Bible on soteriology, I believe they get it wrong. Some people have called Calvary Chapel's view "inconsistent Arminianism." However, I reject this label for several reasons: not only is it unduly abrasive to our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ, one could equally well apply the label "inconsistent Calvinists." After all, if you think somebody is inconsistent, they're inconsistent, and it doesn't really matter what you put after it.

In fact, Calvary Chapel does not teach Arminianism at all, except in the very loose (and thus more inaccurate and abrasive) sense. Rather, they teach a brand of synergism very close to that taught in the majority of Southern Baptist churches. (Or at least the ones who have not gone purpose-driven and thus no longer have any kind of stand on theology at all - but that's another article.) Namely, a belief in "Once Saved, Always Saved", a belief in Total Depravity, but rejection of Limited Atonement and/or Irresistible Grace. So, they are clearly not monergist/Calvinist, but they are also not Arminian in any useful sense.

Thus, Calvary claims to take a middle ground. Calvary Chapel followers often claim that "we're not Calvinist or Arminian but rather Biblicist." This statement I am also forced to reject because it implies that people like myself become Calvinists because either we have some passion to follow John Calvin, or because we're just following the traditions we've been taught. Like the "inconsistent Arminian" label, this statement does a great disservice to their fellow Christians. I want to say: You may not agree with me on theology, but at least do me the honor of assuming that I came by my theology through an honest interpretation of the Biblical data rather than through exalting tradition over the Bible.

But how, from a monergist point of view (for I want to make this honest in the other direction as well) does Calvary Chapel arrive at its synergistic "free will" viewpoint by examining the Bible, when I think it's so clear that monergism is the Biblically-described plan of salvation? I believe that you cannot really derive a libertarian view of free will from the Bible, when it is so abundantly clear that God is in control of everything; rather, I believe it's because of their prior philosophical commitment to their understanding of man's free will. They will interpret all passages in that light. This hypothesis explains almost everything I've read from people who call themselves one, two, three, or four-point Calvinists or "Calminians." To their credit, they make an honest attempt at exegeting the Biblical passages, but with a prior philosophical commitment to libertarian free will.

Besides their synergistic view of soteriology, I have one more problem with Calvary Chapel, which is actually more objectionable. Chuck Smith has always said that he is big on "striking a balance." This is admirable in many ways: it is true that adherence to one tradition-based position or another has needlessly divided the church of Christ on many occasions both in the past and the present. It is true that Calvinism and Arminianism, taken as traditions one learns from their denomination, has often divided Christians from each other. Of course, as I argued above, many Calvinists have reached their beliefs after examination of the Biblical data; however, some have not, and it is good to not be dogmatic based solely on traditions. I agree with Calvary's position on this.

However, doing something in practice is different than doing it in theory; and I have noticed that they are not big on striking a balance in two of the most hotly-contended issues in Christianity today. The first is in their opposition to Calvinism, and only Calvinism. Two examples: George Bryson is sent out from Costa Mesa far and wide, writing such dreadful books as "The Five Points of Calvinism: Weighed and Found Wanting" and "The Dark Side of Calvinism" and making his lopsided and ill-informed speech against Calvinism at the 2003 Calvary West Coast Pastor's Conference. Then we have Dave Hunt (a committed anti-Calvinist) being a frequent speaker at Calvary Chapels. If Calvary truly wanted to be balanced, you'd see publications like "The Dark Side of Arminianism" and James White being invited to speak. Calvary's "balance" is clearly leaning against Calvinism.

In his book "Calvary Chapel Distinctives", Chuck Smith says "When you take hard stands on these non-foundational issues, you'll just empty your church of all of those who have Methodist, Nazarene, and other Arminian-infiuenced backgrounds. Why would you want to do that?" I have to respond that by taking a stand against Calvinism he runs the risk of emptying the church of all those with Presbyterian and Reformed backgrounds, as well as those who (like me) arrived at the doctrine somewhat reluctantly but through honest Biblical study. Why would he want to do that?

The second hot issue, hotter than even the Calvinism / Arminianism debate in today's church, is eschatology. Surely, a church that seeks to take a middle ground and not unnecessarily offend other Christians would not emphasize a doctrine (pre-tribulationism) that has scant Biblical support and that many other Christians reject for good exegetical reasons. Yet, that is exactly what Calvary does.

Note that I am not arguing here that pre-tribulationism is wrong; in fact, for the sake of argument, let's say it's correct. What I am arguing is that Calvary Chapel has taken probably the most contentious debate dividing Christians in the church today and taken a clear and decisive side on one side of that debate. They have taken one of (according to Chuck Smith's book) the founding principles of Calvary Chapel, one that I commend them for, and ignored it. I have no doubt that Pastor Chuck and other Calvary pastors feel strongly that pre-tribulationism is correct. Again, I don't take issue with that: what I take issue with is their strong support of it against every other eschatological view and against their own founding principle of not dividing Christians on disputed doctrines.

Somebody may argue: we oppose Calvinism because it's a tradition of men, but support pre-tribulationism because it is clearly taught in the Bible. Laying aside the question of its perspicuity in the Biblical text, surely many Calvinists would honestly say the same thing about their belief? A Presbyterian would say "I oppose pre-tribulationism because it's a tradition of men, but support Calvinism because is clearly taught in the Bible." I am not supporting either viewpoint here, just saying that either applies equally - taking a "balanced view" of them both, so to speak. (I myself would say that I think pre-millenialism is strongly supported, the pre-tribulational rapture very weakly, and monergism the strongest of all.)

No, if you truly want to be inclusive and not divide Christians, I think you should not take such strong stands on debated issues like pre-tribulationism and exclude all other viewpoints from the discussion. You should not write one of the longest chapters in your "Distinctives" book on this issue. You should not consistently invite Dave Hunt and George Bryson to speak against Calvinism but never invite James White to speak for it, or Dave Hunt to speak on pre-tribulationalism but never invite R.C. Sproul to speak on amillenialism.

These sum up my "not-so-good" points about Calvary Chapel. As I said in the first article, I have some disagreements with the church's teachings, but they are not sufficiently important to break fellowship with the church. They're more like disagreements between family members or friends, and I don't give up on friends (which I have many of in several Calvary Chapels) just because we disagree. In fact, I think what C. S. Lewis said regarding human friends sums up my feelings about Calvary Chapel. Lewis said that the most important thing that makes two people friends is that they agree that the same questions are important. That they agree on the answer, Lewis says, is less important.

This sums up well how I feel about Calvary Chapel: we agree that the most important things are important - the Bible, evangelism, love for our neighbors. That we don't agree on some areas of interpretation of the Bible - important though they may be - is not as important. We change our views with more information; but friends and family members are hopefully for a lifetime.

Striking a balance on Calvary Chapel - the good

2007-10-17T09:33:00.000-04:00

Calvary Chapel publications often say that Calvary "strikes a balance" between extremes in Christian theology and practice - between Calvinist and Arminian, between fundamentalist and charismatic, etc. I thought it might be useful to "strike a balance" on Calvary Chapel itself. For, unlike Marc Antony, I wish neither to unduly praise Calvary nor to bury it. I should say up front that my family attends a Calvary Chapel (Cornerstone Chapel in Leesburg, VA), we have attended for the past 5 years, and we have no plans to leave. Any reader should take this exactly as my other articles: as my thoughts on the subject. So that the article does not get too unwieldy, I am writing it in two installments: the "good" and the "not so good."

I will start by saying that I so appreciate Calvary's reliance on the Bible as the center of everything they do. The typical Calvary - ours included - does verse-by-verse preaching through the Bible as its main source of sermon material. When we started at Cornerstone five years ago, our pastor was preaching from Genesis on both Wednesdays and Sundays. At some point he switched Wednesday sermons to the New Testament, so now we are in Ezekiel on Sunday and Romans on Wednesday. If you have not experienced preaching all the way through the Bible, I cannot recommend it highly enough. I find I get the kind of understanding of the Bible that topical or even book-by-book preaching never gave me - the whole context of the Bible verses, not just individual verses.

This orientation towards the Bible also allows Calvary Chapels to resist the tendencies of modern churches - towards seeker-sensitivity, or emerging "missionality" that water down God's truth to be more palatable for the unsaved. In fact, Calvary founder Chuck Smith wrote a widely-distributed article that includes strongly-opposed position on the emerging church. Besides being remarkable for being one of the few leaders of large church groups to publicly take such a strong stand against these trends, his actions are even more remarkable given that his own son, Chuck Smith, Jr. is a pastor who promotes many trends of the emerging church. I can hardly imagine the difficulty he has felt in so strongly denouncing things taught by his own son.

Because of this, I almost always attend Calvary Chapels when traveling. As I will mention below, to me Calvary Chapel is somewhat like Outback steakhouses - they are not perfect, yet very, very good and consistent in their adherence to teaching the Bible.

Yet, in addition to their Bible-centeredness, Calvary Chapels are generally connected with the culture and community - through the use of things like modern music and close community involvement. There is also an evangelistic focus lacking in many churches of all shades of theology. In my experience, they are "missional" in the good sense (reaching out to unbelievers) without being "missional" in the bad sense (watering down the truth of the Gospel). Thus, I find that sermons (at least of my own pastor) are simultaneously evangelistic to unbelievers, edifying to believers, and exalting to God. That's because they are so closely based on the Bible, and the Bible is evangelistic, edifying, and God-exalting. So many sermons I've heard from other churches lack one or more of these: either edifying and exalting - but require great theological sophistication to understand - or evangelistic with little or no "meat" for more mature believers. (Seeker-oriented "felt needs" sermons, in my experience, are neither evangelistic, edifying, nor God-exalting, but that's another article.)

This orientation toward community is another very strong point in Calvary's favor. I know of people, for example, who drive 30+ miles to go to church on Sundays. Now, this may be necessary in some areas of the world. I work in Vermont sometimes, and there are very few good churches around. Therefore, I drive around 25 miles to Calvary Chapel Burlington because there is literally no other decent church in the area where I work. (If you are in Burlington, say hey to Pastor Kirk for me. He's a great guy with solid, Biblical teaching as well as great fellowship.)

However, in many areas, it is simply not necessary to drive long distances. In my area, Washington D.C., there are a number of solid Bible-teaching churches. It is certainly true that some of them - such as Reston Bible Church - more closely match my theological beliefs than Cornerstone does. However, it is 23 miles away. Besides being inconvenient, it tends to break any kind of community involvement that I might have with the church. Would I drive there Sundays? Probably. What about Wednesday nights or Saturday community functions and projects? Doubtful. And I believe that church membership should be more than a Sunday-only thing. I don't want to be what Spanish-speakers might call a "dominguero" - a Sunday-only church member. Thus, with Cornerstone I can have fellowship with believers, community outreach involvement, and solid Bible-preaching.

In my book, this is a solid combination, and it is why I have no plans on leaving. However, all is not perfect. I will talk about these things a bit in my next article.

Limited Atonement

2007-09-09T21:17:00.001-04:00

Part of a series on the Five Points of Calvinism
[Introduction] [Total Depravity] [Unconditional Election] [Limited Atonement]

The "L", Limited Atonement, is probably the most vilified of the five points of monergism. I have spoken with many people who held a high view of God's sovereignty, and who agreed with points such as Total Depravity and Perseverance of the Saints, but stumbled on Limited Atonement. Limited Atonement can be defined as the understanding that:

Christ's redeeming work was intended to save the elect only, and actually secured salvation for them, and only them.

It is my aim here, as always in this series, to clear up misconceptions about Limited Atonement and make it believable, if not exactly palatable. For I, too, somehow feel the injustice of it. Christ's death - limited only to certain people! It seems so unfair of God. Yet, I have come to believe over my years of growth as a Christian and increasing knowledge of the Bible that it is true.

One thing that Limited Atonement does not mean is that God's saving power is limited somehow, that God is being put in a box, or that God's salvation is any less glorious. What's more, the extent of God's atonement is not limited by any factor except God 's own justice and wisdom. Spurgeon's sermon on this topic is well worth reading.

It also does not mean that God does not love those who are not His elect, nor does it mean (as I have argued before) that believers in Limited Atonement are less evangelistic than those who do not believe in Limited Atonement. It means simply what it says: that the salvific effect Christ's death is only applicable to those who God has elected. In fact, Limited Atonement does not even mean that Christ's death had no effect on those who are not elect. Christ's death had many effects on men, including changing the way God relates to us, handing Satan an intermediate defeat, showing us an example of supreme self-sacrifice, etc. The only effect it does not have for the non-elect (undoubtedly, from our point of view, although perhaps not from God's, the most important) is saving them from their sins.

Now that we've considered what Limited Atonement is and is not, I will try to convince you that it is reasonable. But, before we can consider that question, we need to consider two others first. The first one is: Why do people go to hell? It seems to me that there are only two answers, from a Christian point of view, to that question. First, because they don't believe in Jesus; or, second, because they are sinners who are not covered by Christ's redeeming blood.

Let's consider the first answer. Do people really go to hell because they don't believe in Jesus? I don't see any Scriptural support for that idea. Furthermore, there are real problems with that belief. First, what about the "native in Africa", or the "good Jew" problem? Is it really right that God should punish people forever because they happened to be born in the wrong place, the wrong time, or into the wrong family? What about people before Jesus died? If you go to hell because you don't believe in Jesus, why aren't they all in hell now? (Below I will argue that the second position does not have this problem, although on first blush it seems it does.)

For that matter, what about the good and honest atheist? It seems to me (and it seemed the same to atheists I have actually talked to) that this kind of God would capricious and unworthy of our worship. Now, before you judge me for considering philosophy and man's judgment over revealed truth, I believe in Limited Atonement because I believe it is scriptural, not because I was convinced of it by philosophical considerations such as I am raising now. My discussion here is merely to clear up misconceptions and hopefully to help people better understand the Biblical data, which is always the final court of appeal.

An analogy may help: people who jump out of an airplane without a parachute don't die primarily because they didn't have a parachute, but because they jumped out of the airplane. The parachute could have saved them, but its lack is not the cause of them dying: jumping out of the airplane and hitting the ground is. It's the same with salvation: believing can save us, but lack of believing is not what condemns us.

On the other hand, consider the second answer: that people go to hell because they are sinners. This answer seems to me much better fitting with the Biblical data, as well as other doctrines that I am many non-monergists accept (such as Total Depravity). Further, it does not have the philosophical problems above. It may seem that the native in Africa problem applies, but I believe it does not. The native in Africa (substitute good Jew or atheist if you wish) goes to hell not because they don't believe in Jesus, but because they are sinners. I am a sinner too, of course, which means that I deserve to go to hell just as much as the good native or Jew or Muslim or, for that matter, Adolph Hitler or Josef Stalin. Believing in Jesus saves me from what I otherwise deserve: that's why we call it grace.

In fact, if people went to hell because they did not believe in Jesus, that would make salvation at least in part a work on our parts, and it would not be fully of God's grace. The native in Africa would go to hell because he didn't perform the right work, and I am going to heaven because I did. As Paul would say, "God forbid!"

So, if it is true that men go to hell because they are sinners, let's consider a second question: what is the effect of Christ's death on the cross? Is it that our sin is covered, the guilt of our sins is removed, and we are saved? Or is it simply that we are made savable? It must be the former, because otherwise our sins would still be on our own heads, their effect still upon us. If we are made savable, but God still considers us "dead in our sins and trespasses," and if people go to hell because of their sin, then we would still be going to hell. To avoid going to hell, something needs to remove the guilt of our sins; and that something must be Christ's atoning death. Thus, the effect of Christ's death must be that the guilt of our sins is removed, it is put on His head, and He became sin for us, in our place.

As an aside, I should note that this is the doctrine of substitutionary atonement - Christ took the guilt of our sins on His own head. I have heard people affirm the idea of substitutionary atonement yet deny that the effect of Christ's death was to effectively save people. It seems to me that this is a logical contradiction: the two ideas - substitutionary atonement and Christ's salvific death - are essentially the same thing. In either case, Christ died in our place and took our penalty.

Having considered these two questions, let's finally consider Limited Atonement. If Christ's death takes away the guilt of our sins, for whom did Christ die? It cannot be for the entire world, because then everybody would go to heaven, because the guilt of their sins would be removed. Or, alternatively, it removes the absolute sovereignty of God, because we as men would be able to continually thwart His plans. He planned that Christ would remove the guilt of sin, and thus that we would all go to heaven, but we keep ruining His plans by not believing in Him. That kind of God would be continually frustrated by His creatures.

The only conclusion that makes sense to me is Limited Atonement. Christ's death is perfectly effective for those whom He intends to save, and God's will is never thwarted. Those who He does not save deserve to go to hell (as do we all) because they are sinners, not because they did not believe in Jesus. It's completely by God's grace, not due to anything - not even having faith - that anybody is saved. Praise be to God!

Additional Resources:

monergism.com's Limited Atonement page has lots of them

Preach the Gospel at all times; where necessary use words

2007-08-27T03:45:00.000-04:00

This quote, attributed incorrectly to St. Francis of Assisi, is often used to discourage people from actually preaching the Gospel. It seems to me that one reason it's so popular is that it encourages people to do what they naturally would anyway. After all, look around: you will see lots of examples (not enough, of course) of people being nice to each other. Simply put, it makes us all - unbeliever as well as believer - feel nice to be nice. Being nice salves people's consciences and gives them plusses that they can pile up on that scale in their minds to balance out the minuses and (in their own minds at least) keeps them out of hell. Oh man, I fed my lustful thoughts and then lied about it ... well, let me give a few dollars to these homeless people to balance it off and keep myself in the "credit" column with God.

Don't think I lack sympathy with these people. All too often I would rather work my way back into God's good graces rather than facing the tragic truth that in my flesh dwells nothing good. Reminds one of the old prejudice about the Irish and Polish Catholics going out drinking and carousing all night, and then running in and confessing it in the morning. (It strikes me that while drinking and carousing isn't a good way to spend your night, it may at least bring you to true repentance and genuine conversion, far more likely than going to a lukewarm liberal church, giving to charities, and thinking you're getting an "in" with God.)

Anyway, Ray Comfort has a great column this month about this insidious little Franciscan saying. Read it, and I guarantee (at least, if you're a Christian) you'll never look at this saying the same way again. One small thing that I hesitatingly add is the quote you always hear on Way of the Master Radio: "What Bible verse is that?" There you hear "God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life ... What Bible verse is that?" I would say, similarly:

Preach the Gospel at all times; where necessary use words... What Bible verse is that?

No matter how much one might respect somebody like St. Francis, we must give Scripture a greater weight, and nowhere there do we see this statement or even the sentiment. Scripture is about helping people, true, but I don't see it implying that we can really do that without taking care of their greatest necessity, the spiritual. It sounds very deeply spiritual to say "where necessary use words", but tragically it encourages us to do what we would naturally. Meanwhile, the Gospel of Jesus Christ, that which he shed His own precious blood for, that which the martyrs died to proclaim, is preached less and less. We haughtily say we don't want to be "bullhorn guys," but silently we wish we could be as bold as them, and know we ought to be. We recite little sayings to make us feel better about our fear and timidity, and countless people are - no thanks to us - on their way to hell.

Update: Way of the Master radio has an update on this subject. "Run as fast as you can, where necessary use your legs ... it's a little hard to proclaim something [i.e. the Gospel] if you don't open your mouth." It's a classic.

Apologetics or the Gospel?

2007-08-26T21:53:00.000-04:00

I wanted to post a short item today which came out of a discussion I was having with a teacher. Our kids both attend a Christian school, and I am in general very thankful for them. I believe that most of their teachers are saved, and the ones who aren't at least don't teach heresy. However, many of them (reflecting the Christian church in general) have been seduced by the whole seeker-sensitive belief system. The church that runs the school is very seeker-sensitive, doing the whole "find your purpose" thing, recently promoting luminaries such as Kate Campbell (touring with and promoted by Tony Campolo) and Brennan Manning (see my review of one of his books entitled "Half the Gospel" in the link above). I heard one person from that church complain that they save the people and then other churches steal them. I think it would likely be more accurate to say that people come in, and then they are either saved or bored; if they are really saved, they go where they can be fed; if they are bored, after the fluff wears off, they once again stop attending church. If you're not really saved, going to church is a salve to your conscience for a while, but in the end playing golf usually wins out.

Anyway, the aforementioned teacher and I were having a discussion about the Way of the Master method of evangelism. I have recently acquired the Way of the Master Basic Training Course and am very excited about it, so I naturally wanted to talk about it. I should mention that I have the great respect for this teacher, in terms of her salvation, teaching style, friendliness, love, holiness, and many other things. The last thing I wish to do is impute any kind of questioning of her salvation or motives: she is no doubt far better and purer than I am, and a lot more fun to be around.

However, I believe she has bought into the false gospel of seeker-sensitivity, which I have argued elsewhere is essentially semi-Pelagianism reborn. In our discussion, I said that it was important to help people get to where their conscience is awakened by God; because the Gospel can only be accepted - and even understood - when accompanied by true repentance and brokenness. She disagreed, saying that "friendship evangelism" is more important. My rejoinder was that it seems to me that friendship is important, but one should not confuse it with evangelism. She didn't articulate exactly why she disagreed with me, but it was clear she did. I probably should have listened more closely to what her objections were, but frankly I was nervous about disagreeing with her. So often, I am a people-pleaser and don't like to disagree.

She then told me what she had been studying recently, which is apologetics. Now, I agree with her that apologetics is very important. Every believer should know exactly what he believes and why. And when confronted with people who have honest questions and doubts about Christianity - and these do come along occasionally - we should always be prepared to make a defense for the hope that is in us. Of course, the majority of unbelievers are not honestly questioning:

What do you mean Christianity is true? Well, what about the native in Africa? And if God is good, how come disasters strike? And how could a God of love send people to hell anyway? And what about all the contradictions in the Bible? And ...

When a stream of questions like that come out - and always the same ones, of course - you are probably not dealing with an honest doubter. But there are some, which is why I agree that studying apologetics is important. In fact, the Way of the Master video series contains a section on apologetics, answering the most common objections. So, Ray Comfort and I would agree with this teacher that apologetics is important.

However, then she made an statement that stopped me cold. She said that she was convinced that lack of apologetics training is what is causing so many people to come to their church, get "saved," and then fall away. Thus, to keep people "saved," you have to teach them apologetics. Now, I am not questioning that a knowledge of apologetics helps us to maintain a strong faith: clearly it does. We are all tossed like ships on the sea of emotion from time to time. But I don't think that's what she was talking about. I think she was talking about people who come to church a few times; "make a decision for Christ;" go to church a while more; and then fall away, presumably never to be heard from again.

At first I was stunned - how could a few intellectual doubts "unsave" a person who had been regenerated by God's Holy Spirit? How is it that Jesus can lose some that the Father has given Him, simply because of some intellectual difficulties? Then I realized the problem: I was up against semi-Pelagian assumptions. In this system, people can come, get attracted by Jesus, even choose to make Him their Lord (lucky Jesus!), but at the first intellectual doubt, their sovereign intellect will decide against the existence of God, and thus they will fall away.

I answered that I thought many times the problem is not that they have accepted the Gospel, but that they had never heard the Gospel. I think she was getting uncomfortable with the conversation, and we parted amicably for the night. I don't know when we'll have a chance to talk on this subject again, but I hope I can help her understand that the Gospel is not about us making a decision, but about the decision that God makes for our benefits.

Apologetics is good. It builds up our faith. What it does NOT do is create the faith in the first place; it does not turn an unbeliever who has never even really come to a realization of his utter sinfulness and lostness into a believer. Only God can do that, putting in a heart of flesh to replace our hearts of stone. In other words, apologetics is no replacement for the Gospel.

Unconditional Election

2007-08-16T09:41:00.000-04:00

Part of a series on the Five Points of Calvinism
[Introduction] [Total Depravity] [Unconditional Election] [Limited Atonement]

The second part of TULIP is, of course, the U: Unconditional Election. This seems like a doctrine that no believing Christian could argue with, because the Bible so continually talks about election from cover to cover. God elected Noah and his out of all the men on earth at the time; God elected Lot out of Sodom; God elected Joseph our of the sons of Jacob; God elected Moses out of all those babies who died to not only be saved from the Pharaoh's order, but ultimately to save "Israel mine elect" out of all the nations of the earth, such as the Amalekites; God chose Isaac and Jacob but rejected Ishmael and Esau, and not because of what they had done; God elected Saul though he had hid himself among the stuff to escape being chosen; God elected David from among his brothers to be king, and ultimately every king of Israel thereafter; and the list goes on.

Then in the New Testament, the disciples did not choose Jesus, Jesus chose them; God first chose the Jews to receive salvation, then the Gentiles; God chose Peter (unwilling though he was) to start the transition to allowing Gentiles into the church; he even chose Saul to be an apostle period, though he was completely unwilling. Ephesians 1:3-14 best sums it up:

He chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love He predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. (Ephesians 1:4-6 ESV)

Note that in every case, God did the choosing without regard to whether the person had done anything good or not (i.e. unconditionally); in fact, in many cases (e.g. Lot, Saul the king, Saul/Paul the apostle), the person chosen was quite wicked. So the fact of election should be so clear in the Bible from cover to cover, that there should be no discussion required, at least among Christians. (Unbelievers also disagree with the idea of God's election, of course, but that would be expected.)

Yet, Christians rail at the idea of God choosing unconditionally. Or, perhaps it would be more accurate to say that people have no problem with the idea of God choosing unconditionally in all the above cases, but they rail at the idea of God choosing us unconditionally for salvation. Why is that? It seems to me that if you have a problem with God choosing us unconditionally for salvation, God has a lot more to answer for that just that. What about all the other people on earth in Noah's time? What about those poor babies in Moses's? What about the Gentiles for thousands of years before God sovereignly chose them in the New Testament days? Where does God get the right to make all those choices unconditionally?

He has the right, of course, because He is God, and we are not. And since we trust that God is right in making all those decisions, why not trust that God will rightly make the election decision as well? Yet, we don't. One of the worst examples is Dr. Nelson Price's wretched bus stop analogy. Where do I get off calling it "wretched"? I call it that because, although I highly respect Dr. Price in so many ways, his analogy so completely ignores the facts that it's almost criminal. It would be like me saying that the reason we should not be atheists is because atheists kill babies. In fact, it's worse than that, because a logical result of believing in atheism is that human life is not worth anything, therefore killing babies can be justified by any number of practical reasons.

However, no Calvinist/monergist could believe what the bus stop analogy seems to say that they believe. Nobody believes that a "missionary couple who with zeal have served Christ all their lives" would be rejected by God because they are not among the elect, and that for two reasons. First, we cannot look at that missionary couple and know for sure if they are among the elect. It may be that they were externally serving Christ because they thought they could earn their way to heaven: like the little boy in the joke being told by his mother to stand up against his will, perhaps they are standing up on the outside but sitting down on the inside. Perhaps they are missionaries because an elderly relative promised them a big inheritance if they became missionaries. The truth is, neither I nor you can truly judge somebody else's motives; heck, we have a hard enough time judging our own. But surely God can rightly judge people's motives. And this is one reason why the bus stop analogy is bad: because God would never judge wrongly, as the analogy implies.

The second reason why the analogy is bad, of course, is more basic: that missionary couple would never want to serve Christ with zeal in the first place (assuming that zeal was real and holy) unless God had first elected them and then regenerated their hearts, taken out the heart of stone and put in the heart of flesh.

So what do Christians who wish to deny Unconditional Election do with the many Biblical texts that teach election? They redefine it. In the above article, Dr. Price defines election as being that God "gave man a free will to choose his or her eternal destiny depending of his or her faith in Christ." In other words, in a way that is compatible with the presupposition of libertarian free will. I am not sure what text that comes from; in fact I would say that such a definition of election is completely against all the examples of sovereign election given above. Is it possible that this is what God means by "election" in this one particular instance? Sure, but it militates against every other example of election ever given in the Bible. The evidence for that understanding would have to be very strong to go against the entire tenor of Scripture like that, and I submit that it is not. The references below contain many references that show exactly that.

Another redefinition is by Dr. Ergun Caner. He signs many blog posts with the tag line "Elected because I selected" and this, in fact, seems to be a catchphrase of his. With all due respect to Dr. Caner (who I do in fact respect very much), that makes no sense at all. In what sphere of life is my choice the cause of being "elected" or "chosen"? Am I elected President of the USA because I want to be? Am I chosen captain of the hockey team because I chose to be? Did Israel become God's chosen people because they decided to be? No! In fact, I'd submit that the idea that "elected because I selected" would never be proposed for any use of the word "elected" if not to counteract the obvious meaning of the Biblical doctrine of election.

So, if you chose to disbelieve in Unconditional Election, do it for good and consistent reasons: don't believe that God is sovereign over every sphere of life, especially including man's salvation. But don't pull the word out of the Bible and then redefine it to a completely alien concept based on your presupposition of man's libertarian free will.

Additional Resources:

Spurgeon on Election
A "Southern Baptist" on Election
Boettner on Election

Total Depravity

2007-08-10T14:01:00.000-04:00

Part of a series on the Five Points of Calvinism
[Introduction] [Total Depravity] [Unconditional Election] [Limited Atonement]

The first of the five points is, of course, Total Depravity: the idea that sin touches every aspect of our lives and makes us naturally incapable of doing anything at all that is good in God's sight. This does not mean, of course, that we do not do anything good (more below); but, when applied to the soteriological question, we cannot do anything that merits our salvation. The most straightforward Biblical statement of the doctrine, it seems to me, is Romans 8:7-8 (ESV):

For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

As with many doctrines, there have been major misunderstandings of Total Depravity by those who don't hold it. One of the foremost that comes to mind was that of one of the men God has used in my life: C. S. Lewis. Lewis said:

"The doctrine of Total Depravity -- when the consequence is drawn that, since we are totally depraved, our idea of good is worth simply nothing -- may thus turn Christianity into a form of devil worship" (The Problem of Pain, HarperCollins edition 2001, p. 29)... "I disbelieve that doctrine partly on the logical ground that if our depravity were total we should not know ourselves to be depraved, and partly because experience shows us much goodness in human nature. (ibid, p.61)

I cannot begin to explain the extent of influence Lewis has had in my life for the better - it was his writings that largely led me to intellectually accept the truth of Christianity - but I cannot agree with his statement here. Lewis is begging the question in a subtle, unstated way. The doctrine does indeed mean that sin affects every part of us, including our moral judgments. However, Lewis judges the doctrine based on a synergistic understanding of salvation: the doctrine says that our depravity causes us to be unable to respond to God, which (in his view) makes believers power worshipers or, at best, robots. In other words, Lewis is using an Arminian understanding of salvation (that sinners can freely respond to God) to judge a non-Arminian doctrine. Naturally, if Arminian soteriology is true, then Total Depravity is to be rejected.

However, just you don't judge a football game according to the rules of baseball, you don't take an Arminian assumption and use it to judge Calvinism. The Arminian assumption is that we can choose to follow God, which negates the doctrine. However, the Calvinist understanding is based on the idea that we cannot choose to follow God: that sin has so infected our spirits that none of us wants to follow God. In other words, using Arminianism to argue against Total Depravity is begging the question. Total Depravity must not be determined by Arminian presuppositions - or Calvinistic, for that matter - but rather Biblical support. (There's lots of support, of course: see comments by John Piper, R. C. Sproul, Herman Hanko, and many others. My main purpose here is not to defend the doctrine per se, but to relate my own thoughts on the subject.)

The last part of the quote above, that there is "much goodness in human nature," is also a question-begging assumption. The assumption seems to be that human nature, per se, contains much that is good. But that assumption is simply a negative statement of Total Depravity. In fact, I believe that the Bible does support the idea that in my flesh there is nothing good; all good things come from God Himself. It is not our nature that causes us to do good things, but rather God, who causes rain to fall on the just as well as the unjust. If we are thoughtful and caring towards our fellow-man, there's only one reason: God's grace, poured out on us though we don't deserve it.

Among those who demur from the Arminian position, Total Depravity seems to me to be among the most popular of the five points. People sometimes claim to be one-, two-, three-, or four-point Calvinists (a former pastor of mine called himself a three-and-a-half pointer), but it seems that the one they always include is Total Depravity. This seems to me to be based on a misunderstanding as well. In fact, the five points of Calvinism are not things you can really pick and choose (same for the five points brought forth first by the Remonstrants). The five points of both are the constituent parts of the appropriate Biblical understanding. If you do not have the basic Biblical understanding, you almost certainly do not subscribe to any of the parts.

In fact, in a very real sense, Total Depravity is not just one of the five points: it is THE foundational point. Sin has completely permeated our being: mind, soul, and spirit. It has made us spiritually dead, unable to initiate love towards God (such as the Pelagians would say) or even respond to the love God shows us (such as the Arminians would say). If you really believe in Total Depravity, it seems to me that you cannot believe in any form of synergism. God loves us, but due to our depravity, we cannot respond to His love; we are dead in our sins and trespasses.

The idea that I am able to respond to God's love in such a state seems to negate the idea of Total Depravity, as well as (more importantly) the Biblical analogy of being dead. Lazarus didn't reach out and accept the resurrection Jesus was offering him - he was unable to do anything until Jesus brought him back from the dead. So, it seems that if one wants to reject Total Depravity, one should reject it; but to cling to the idea of Total Depravity and reject the other soteriological tenets of Calvinism makes no sense to me.

The Five Points of Calvinism

2007-08-06T20:24:00.001-04:00

Part of a series on the Five Points of Calvinism
[Introduction] [Total Depravity] [Unconditional Election] [Limited Atonement]

It should come as no surprise to anybody who reads this blog (if there were some day to be such people, that is) that I am a five-point Calvinist. Note that this is distinct from what one denizen of Kim Riddlebarger's blog called "fifty-point Calvinism," i.e., following Calvin's every teaching. It is largely for this reason that I like to call myself (and people who believe similarly such as Reformed Baptists, John MacArthur, etc.) "monergists." If I don't accept all Calvin's teachings, perhaps I shouldn't take his name as my description.

There are many descriptions extant of what the five points of monergism really mean and where they came from. There are certainly fine expositions of the five points out there. But I do not wish to write another one. My goal is to write down my thoughts on each, especially from the perspective of somebody who has not embraced monergism until recently. If I succeed in this goal, perhaps I can help somebody else to understand the five points a little better as well.

Speaking of the latter, I have heard a number of times synergists who expect to shock us by telling us that "Calvin didn't even believe in Calvinism," presumably meaning - if it means anything at all - that Calvin did not formulate his famous five points. It's not a great shocker. The five points, as most monergists know, were formulated by the Synod of Dort over fifty years after Calvin died. They were formulated as a response to the five points of the Remonstrants, followers of Jakob Harmenszoon, also known as Arminius. Thus, it was the Arminians who first formulated five points: the Calvinists created theirs as an answer.

The initial observation I wish to make, in fact, builds on this fact. The five points were not formulated - or even unequivocally stated - by Calvin. This fact does not bother me in the least, because, frankly, I don't care what John Calvin said. I don't believe "Calvinism" to be the truth because Calvin said it, but because I believe it is the best systematic presentation I know with of the overall teachings of the Bible in the area of soteriology. And I have seen a few: I first became a Christian primarily by reading C. S. Lewis, who was a pretty thorough-going Arminian. (I think he clearly rejected Total Depravity, Unconditional Election, and Persistence of the Saints; I'm not sure where he'd fall on Limited Atonement and Irresistible Grace.) Thus, I also became an Arminian. As I learned more and more teachings of the Bible, I rejected outright Arminianism and moved along my scale to become what I'd call a "semi-Calvinist." Finally, about eight months ago, I accepted the monergist view of salvation.

At no point in this process did the explicit teachings of Calvin come into play; in fact, on some points taught by Calvin, I was far more in accord with his beliefs at the beginning than at the end of the process. For example, regarding paedobaptism, I was brought up in the Roman Catholic Church and became a Christian in the Episcopal Church under (as I said) heavy influence of C. S. Lewis. If anybody had a basis for believing in paedobaptism, it was me. Yet I gradually came to reject a number of the teachings of Calvin and others, while embracing that which I believe is Biblical.

I think most monergists would have a similar story. However, I have heard the most ludicrous statements by anti-Calvinists along these lines. I heard one Southern Baptist preacher imply that the result of coming to believe reformed doctrine is to become a paedobaptist. Another, a well-known seminary professor who should certainly know better, said that some Calvinists think that JC stands for John Calvin instead of Jesus Christ. There are weasel words here, no doubt, so that, if challenged, these men would say "I didn't mean all, I meant only some Calvinists think that way." But, in fact, the bias in the mind of the speaker, and that intended to be created in the mind of the listener, is clear.

After all, since the avowed intention of the speakers is to dissuade people from believing reformed theology, what good would it do to really say that "some Calvinists" believe such-and-such? I could say "some synergists kill babies," which would be true if even one of them did; but it would have no bearing whatsoever on whether one should listen to synergist soteriological doctrines unless I was implying that all or most synergists do so, and that killing babies is a near-inevitable result of following the synergist doctrine.

That is ridiculous, of course: the vast majority of born-again synergist Christians no more support abortion than any monergist, and thus I would never use such comparisons. But synergists don't seem to have a problem using them. I am not, for the same reason, trying to use this as an argument against synergist soteriology: simply imploring synergists not to use them.

Anyway, thus begins my series on the five points. I hope it will be edifying to somebody, and clarifying to myself.

Us Mean Calvinists

2007-07-31T12:52:00.001-04:00

Am I a mean Calvinist? I am afraid that sometimes I come off that way.

In a discussion recently with a good friend of mine, the question of Calvinists and evangelism came up. I said that we Calvinists evangelize because God told us to. She was gracious (especially so given her very tender age of 25 26) but gently pointed out that people have a negative impression of Calvinists for exactly that kind of reason. It seemed to her that we may evangelize, but it's like it's a duty - we do it because we have to, not because we love the people and want to see them saved.

That got me thinking. Now, her impression is certainly false for me - and I know she knows it, as we are both counselors at a crisis pregnancy center. I love people and want to serve them in part because it's a wonderful opportunity that God gives me. But I know what she's talking about. If you didn't know me as well as she does, you might come away from a statement like mine with a distaste for Calvinists. You might get the idea that Calvinism drives people to be highly logical, but also to have no life or love of God in them.

I can't help but think of experiences that I have had on the chat channel of a well-known Christian ministry. I hung around there for several weeks, but ultimately stopped because a number of the denizens came across as just plain nasty. Sure, they were logical, and I agreed with them for the most part on their theology ... but they were not a lot of fun to be around.

The sad part is that I believe many of them, if you actually talked to them one-on-one, are probably decent and even friendly people: many probably friendlier and more loving than I am myself. However, in the chat/blog environment, or even in person sometimes, many times our pride causes us to put on airs, to try to out-argue people and be right at all costs: truth at the expense of love. And though I don't like to admit it, I see this tendency in myself.

Perhaps my friend at the beginning of this post was seeing that in me. And if I had that kind of reaction when saw this attitude in my fellow Calvinists, whom I agreed with theologically, wouldn't the person who disagreed with them have at least as bad of a reaction? That's too bad, because emotional reactions like this can insulate somebody from the truth. I have a feeling that there are a large number of Christians who don't consider the Biblical truths of monergism because of an emotional reaction. The feel more comfortable with the synergists.

That's a shame, and something I will strive to work on in the future. Thanks for putting me onto this, Eve.

More on Friendship Evangelism

2007-07-20T10:50:00.000-04:00

Part of a series on Friendship and Evangelism
[Two Ways] [Leaving 'em Hanging] [More on Friendship]

I was talking about the concept of friendship evangelism with a good friend of mine last night, and she (as usual for her) made a very insightful comment. She agreed with what I was saying about friendship not being the same as evangelism, and then added "in fact, I've found it sometimes gets harder to share the whole Gospel with somebody as I get to know them better."

It made a lot of sense to me, and is quite in accord with my own experience. Thinking about the different stages of a friendship, I think we can delimit the following stages, which follow fairly closely popular communication intimacy models:

First meeting: The point where you first meet the person. This can take place either through another friend or by meeting somebody cold (e.g. on the street, at a conference)
Acquaintanceship: You know each other, act friendly to each other, but that's about it. You discuss facts and opinions but that's about it.
Friendship: You start to discuss feelings and want to spend more time together.
Deep friendship: You trust each other to be vulnerable and discuss your needs.

We reach this fourth level with very few people: most stay in the first three categories. Even if we wanted to and there were enough people out there with whom we have enough in common, we don't have sufficient time to devote. This makes me wonder whether we ought to resurrect the old-fashioned idea of circles of deep friendships similar to C. S. Lewis's Inklings group - you have the luxury of close friendships without the exorbitant time demands required if you met with each of them separately.

Anyway, if we think about these levels of friendship as related to evangelism with my friend's comment in mind, it seems that the folks who try to give the Gospel at the First Meeting level might qualify as "bullhorn guys." (By the way, unlike Rob Bell, I think there's a place for that kind of evangelism - after all, the reality is that some of these folks would never get close enough to a Christian otherwise to hear the Gospel. You can't practice "friendship evangelism" with them, because they simply don't want to be your friend. Frankly, if I were them, I would question your sincerity anyway: "You want to be my friend so you can share the Gospel with me? What am I, chopped liver?) If you listen to the Way of the Master radio show, you'll hear people sharing the Gospel at this point without being pushy stereotypical bullhorn guys, and we all should be able to do it if God arranges appropriate circumstances. But for most of us (not especially gifted in evangelism), most of the time, this level is probably not the place for sharing the Gospel.

At the fourth level, Deep Friendship, you can talk about anything without worrying about offense (always assuming, of course, you do it lovingly). At this level, hopefully, you would feel comfortable talking about the full Gospel, including sin and repentance. That assumes, of course, that you are ever comfortable sharing it. Way of the Master is ideal for learning how to be comfortable sharing the real Gospel, no matter who you're talking to. Unlike what some people think, it's not just for people you accost on the street: it's for learning to share the whole Gospel with anybody.

However, it is these middle levels I think my friend was talking about. It is hard, when you are in that level 2-3 area with a person (acquaintanceship to friendship), to talk about "icky" and non-friendly things. I may be wanting to get to know this person better because I feel we have things in common, and I honestly don't want to mess it up by talking about threatening things like the Gospel. At this point, if my own experience is correct, they have started to trust me, but not to fully trust me. Thus, not wanting to offend, I find excuses not to share the complete Gospel. And since I actually advance to the Deep Friendship level with few of those people, I never actually get around to helping them see their need for a savior.

In my counseling at 1st Choice Women's Health Center (despite the center's name, we also counsel men, usually the boyfriends of the young women that come in), I am in kind of an odd situation. I don't really know the people - usually having just met them - but we talk about an entire range of things: the whole gamut of levels of communication despite the fact that we may have just met. That's a situation that is rather unusual, but it still has the same challenges: the same opportunities to share the Gospel, the same slight natural resistance to the icky-ness of it all.

So what is the solution? First is to pray, of course ... pray for opportunities with people, pray that you'll recognize times when the other person may be more open to God's truth, pray for the boldness to step forward and start the "icky" conversation when need be, and pray that you'll have the right words to say. Second is to get yourself trained. I keep mentioning Way of the Master. The more I know of them, the more I appreciate them. There are several useful aspects to their ministry:

The radio show is very valuable because you hear a wide variety of situations in which the guys share the Gospel, as well as tips. Just recently, for example, they talked about good and bad experiences with witnessing, and how you can feel closer to God after a bad session of witnessing to people because you find yourself praying for that person more.
They have the Training Courses - basic and now advanced.
They have a TV show that may be available in your area or on your satellite. Another resource that I have just found out about is Streaming Faith, which apparently shows the show several times a week on its various constituent broadcast stations. For example, TBN has the show on Monday nights at 7:00 Eastern. (Believe me, I don't like TBN any more than you do, probably - but they do have some good shows.)
They also have lots of tracts. Ray Comfort apparently is a big believer in tracts. I personally wonder whether they are really effective: I never would have paid attention to a tract when I was an unbeliever. But that's a personal opinion: lots of people say they are very useful tools, and Way of the Master has many kinds.

So, there's really no excuse. Finally, get out there and share the whole Biblical Gospel. You'll never do it if you don't start!

Seeker Churches and Book of Acts

2007-07-18T18:54:00.001-04:00

My friend Joe Carr (and I do consider him a friend and a brother in the Lord, though we strongly disagree) talks about the church in the book of Acts and compares his own church, Lifepoint, favorably with the church in Acts. I totally agree with him about the folks in Acts. But how is that related to most seeker churches today, including, I am sorry to say but I am believing this increasingly, Lifepoint? Taking some of his points about the church in Acts:

They were consumed with presenting Jesus: From what I've heard (two sermons now, more below), Lifepoint seems to me consumed with being cool, funny, and "relevant" with no real presentation of Jesus that I've heard so far; certainly no presentation that would convict somebody to repentance.
They would go to any lengths to reach people: Yes, and this primarily included preaching the whole Gospel to the people. In the two sermons I've listened to now, the better one of the two spent just over 10 minutes of the 40 discussing anything from the word of God; the rest was personal experiences and emotional exhortations to practice "what if thinking." The worse of the two was 2.5 minutes of anything even remotely Biblical with the rest of the time spent in sexual jokes and self-help advice.
They offended the Pharisees: Actually, a number of Pharisees came to faith in Christ, and it was purely by preaching the whole word of God to them. I know the Pharisees aren't in the demographic a lot of churches are trying to reach, but Pharisees need Jesus too. What's more, Jesus confirmed the Pharisees' understanding of several important issues against the more "liberal" Sadducees.
The number of believers grew unbelievably. Yes, they did; but in every case the believers were made by taking them to the Scriptures, even the philosophers at the Areopagus. Remember too that Jesus had a large number of "disciples" who fell away at the first hard saying - in fact, most of his "disciples" did so, if you count numerically. This kind of "disciple" we don't need; and, if my experience with seeker churches is any indication, their "disciples" will never hear the kind of hard sayings Jesus gave them.

Now, a lot of what I hear at churches like Lifepoint is very nice. It pumps people up; maybe even motivates them to get off their rear ends and do something good for somebody else. That's great: I myself spend a good deal of time and money ministering to people in my community. "Making disciples" is all the rage today, which is good as far as it goes.

But making disciples is absolutely worthless unless their hearts are converted first. Paul had lots of good deeds, but he considered them all rubbish compared to the glory of really knowing God. The two sermons I've listened to from Lifepoint are enjoyable and motivational, but it pains me to say that no way would they ever bring the unbeliever to know God. And isn't that what the unbelievers coming to Lifepoint (and all other churches, I'm honestly not trying to bust on Lifepoint) need first? To come to know God? There's plenty of time for good deeds after their hearts are converted, and then you should exhort people to do them as much as you can: but the conversion must come first. And I have heard nothing in the 80 minutes or so that I've invested in Lifepoint sermons that would make the unbeliever realize that he is a sinner and needs the living Christ as Lord of his life.

Again, don't think I'm dissing the Lifepoint pastor's intentions here. I can hear his heart - and Joe's - for the lost and hurting people, and I appreciate it. I think what they're doing on this trip to Brazil is wonderful, I thank them, and I have been praying for their efforts there. Rather, I think it's a philosophical problem that has eternal consequences for people. It appears that many believe people can be motivated into being Christians by relevant talk and emotional exhortations. This is generally called semi-Pelagianism, and if it were true, the seeker method would work well.

Sadly, the Bible tells a different story. Only if God converts our hearts - which only comes through the solid and consistent preaching of the Word - do we become Christians. Will those people going out there and exercising their "what if thinking" help the world? No doubt they will. Meanwhile, the poor souls themselves will be smug in their belief that they're getting an "in" with God, while moving along briskly to Hell. That breaks my heart as much as the plight of the orphans in Brazil.

Leaving 'em hanging

2007-07-17T10:20:00.001-04:00

Part of a series on Friendship and Evangelism
[Two Ways] [Leaving 'em Hanging] [More on Friendship]

I listen to Way of the Master Radio often. It's entertaining, but the main reason I listen is to sharpen my own understanding of how to share the whole Gospel with people and how to respond to their objections. Not that I think I can talk them into being Christians: but unregenerate people (as we all were at one time) throw up all kinds of objections, and it's useful to think through in advance what they might be. I mean, like most people, although I try to practice friendship evangelism, it's a lot easier for me to do the friendship part than to do the evangelism part, so I need some extra training on the latter.

One of the things I've noticed recently, such as in Todd Friel's talking with Wilmar, is that Ray and Todd often refrain from "going for the closer": they do not end their presentations by leading the person in a sinner's prayer, they only lead them halfway down the "Romans Road." At first, this struck me as odd. Isn't the whole point of evangelization to get people saved? Why not take them through all Four Spiritual Laws? If you leave them hanging like that, they may lose the opportunity to come to faith!

But when I thought more about it, it made a whole lot of sense. Oftentimes, I know in my own life, that the Spirit of God convicts me of things in the still of the night, and when I least expect it. The choice, then, is sometimes to rush the witnessee into a too-fast profession of faith or to leave them to the Holy Spirit to convict of their sins. It seems to me wiser to trust that God knows what He is doing: that He will keep working on their conscience, using your words and half-remembered Bible verses, until they come to true repentance and faith.

In other words, if you rush them through the Four Spiritual Laws, you may get a quick profession of faith, but that apparent faith may really be a cover-up for a lack of true conviction. They may well be going through the motions to get rid of you, or worse, may actually go straight from unbeliever to unregenerate "disciple," thinking themselves followers of Jesus when their heart is not truly converted. These are exactly the kinds of "disciples" who left Jesus at the first sign of difficulty, and I believe that easy-believing "Jesus wants to be your friend, solve your marital problems, give your life 'purpose', etc." kind of "evangelism" tends to breed them. Anybody with a church history will admit in principle that we are sinners; but only actually feeling it and knowing it to your core will bring repentance and saving faith.

On the other hand, if you let them stew in their own sinfulness, they may still ignore you; however, when they least expect it, God may also bring them to that true repentance that leads to faith and conversion. "But," I can hear somebody saying (because I said it myself when I first started pondering this question) "if they don't believe now, they may never do it!" That question reveals a wrong theology, that of decisional regeneration. As that linked document says, decisional regeneration is the doctrine that "an individual is saved by a mere 'decision of the will' ... that men can be saved by merely making a conscious choice to be saved."

But it's not a matter of me making a decision for Christ, thank God (I mean that literally!): it's a matter of God making a decision for me and then replacing my heart of stone with a heart of flesh. And I believe whole-heartedly that Jesus will not let that person go; He will not lose even one the Father gives Him.

So, if the person is truly receptive, by all means lead them down the Romans Road, use all four Spiritual Laws, or whatever little method you like to use. That is valuable if God chooses you to be the one who leads that person across the last step. On the other hand, many times we are doing the "up front" work ... planting and watering rather than reaping the harvest. It may be less glamorous, but it's no less necessary. Let's not mess it up by rushing our friend past the planting and watering stages. He may not say that sinner's prayer with you standing there; but if God wants that person, his heart will whisper it, even if it's on his own with nobody around to lead him.

Two ways of evangelizing?

2007-07-16T16:28:00.000-04:00

Part of a series on Friendship and Evangelism
[Two Ways] [Leaving 'em Hanging] [More on Friendship]

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. (Matthew 28:19, ESV)

All believers are told to evangelize. If you don't agree with that, the verse says to make disciples and teach them to observe all things God has commanded. First off, this must mean true disciples, those who are regenerated by the Spirit of God. So many churches today are discipleship-driven, even talking about unregenerate people simply as pre-disciples (a ridiculous name if I have ever heard one). Making "disciples" who have not been regenerated is a waste of time and a terribly sad thing to behold: people thinking they're saved but on the way to hell. They have never been told the full gospel in its glory.

But, given that we are to evangelize, the question is how. Historically (i.e. throughout the history of the church, including the New Testament), evangelism meant primarily preaching sin and repentance. After all, only if you understand your own sinfulness can you ever understand the Gospel. In fact, the good news is only good if we see it as the solution to the problem of sin that we know we have. After all, what's the message of the first three chapters of Romans? (1) Sin is real, and it's progressive, leading to worse and worse offenses. (2) Jews and nominal Christians don't get off the hook because they're relatively good. (3) The problem is everybody's, and we have no hope on our own.

Only in that light does the Gospel show up for what it is. I love how Paul, after he has just spent 2 chapters saying things like:

There is none righteous, no, not one;
There is none who understands;
There is none who seeks after God. Romans 3:10-11 (NKJV)

and gets everybody in a state where they finally see their own sinfulness in all its terrible reality, says:

But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, even the righteousness of God, through faith in Jesus Christ, to all and on all who believe. Romans 3:21-22 (NKJV)

In the mindset of somebody who really understands what Paul is saying in the first three chapters of Romans, and feels it to the depth of their soul, "But now" must be the two most beautiful words in the English language. Now that's what I call "good news." Good news is good primarily in comparison to bad news, and the first 2.5 chapters of Romans have been bad news.

Nowadays, on the other hand, there seems to be a push to kinder, gentler evangelism. The bullhorn guys are out, considered too mean, a relic of the past: relationship evangelism is in. Watch how you live; be nice; in the words of the immortal movie Jonah, "Be a friend, say your prayers, heaven loves a heart that cares."

Now, I am quick to add that I have no problem with this approach; in fact, it's very important. As they always say, "they don't care what you know until they know you care." However, I know from personal experience that it is very easy to think that I am evangelizing somebody by being their friend. In fact, I think the term "friendship evangelism" is entirely a misnomer. Friendship may bring both of us warm fuzzy feelings. We may talk about God or even Jesus in nice, non-threatening ways. Friendship is many good things: it's good, it's nice, it's wholesome, it's good for breaking down barriers.

The one thing that it is not, however, is evangelism. At best, friendship is a protoevangelion: that which comes before the evangel or good news. Unless you are a complete Pelagian, you can never believe that friendship alone will bring somebody to faith in Christ. There's only one thing that brings people to faith in Christ: the faith and repentance that comes from a changed heart. These will only come when a person realizes their lostness, their hopeless situation; and these will only come when a person is truly convicted of their sins.

In other words, it's easy to pretend that we can be a friend (which is generally pretty easy) and skip over the hard bit of sharing our faith. Or, perhaps I should say, it is easy for some people. Every one of us has some things that are hard for us to do and others that are easy. For the stereotypical bullhorn guy (if such a person actually exists), it's easy to preach sin and repentance but hard to be a friend. For many, many others - I would venture to say the vast majority of us - it's easy to be a friend but hard to preach sin and repentance; but the people we want to witness to need both. I can be a friend to somebody easily, I can "share my faith" if that means talking about church and even my own testimony; but I completely seize up when it comes to talking about sin and, in short, anything that might actually bring the other person to repentance. It's "yucky" - and it's not "friendly" in the commonly-understood sense.

So, what is the role of friendship in evangelism? I think it's important to help break down barriers people erect against the Gospel. As somebody said, the Gospel is an offense in itself; we should not add to that offense with our actions. But it should not be confused with sharing the Gospel or anything that would convict a person of his or her sins. After all, conviction of sins is not friendship's natural way of talking. To help somebody come to a realization of their sinfulness is not friendly; yet it's vitally important for them to know about them, realize their lostness, and only then can they come to faith in Christ.

What I am trying to guard against is that smugness we - I - can feel when we're doing friendship evangelism, feeling that we are superior to those bullhorn guys yelling the Gospel at people. In fact, I think most of us know in our hearts that we are not really sharing the Gospel: the Romans Road is great, but to somebody who does not really and truly, down deep in their heart, understand their sinfulness, it's just a bunch of words. Somehow, however, we feel quite certain that, when the time comes, we will really give them a full Gospel presentation. How often does that time never come? Or an opportunity comes up and we chicken out - again - and promise ourselves we'll do better next time?

So, let's get sensitivity towards "friendship evangelism," by all means. Let's try and be friendly to people, break down barriers, and all the rest. But let's not forget to get some help on preaching the real Gospel as well. I highly recommend the Way of the Master materials. They also have an Internet radio show that you may want to listen to. The radio show is great because they cover so many different situations, so many different kinds of objections to Christianity.

There are not two ways of evangelism we can pick and choose from. There are really only two different aspects of one way, and we must master both of them to win that lost and hurting world.

Confessions of an eBay Sniper

2007-07-13T12:26:00.000-04:00

"Gary, welcome to ESA (eBay Sniper's Anonymous)."
"Hello. My name is Gary, and I'm an eBay sniper. (Imagine supportive applause here)

Ok, I said it. I love to get stuff in the mail, I love to buy stuff from eBay, and I love to snipe auctions. For anybody still living in 1997, sniping is the practice of bidding on an item in eBay at the last second (actually, when I did it manually I usually did it with about 10 seconds to go, although I have unintentionally submitted bids as late as 1 second before the end of the auction). To many people, this kind of practice is "in theory ... against the rules," not to mention mean, unfair, immoral, un-Christian, and perhaps "characteristic of mean Calvinists."

I totally disagree with all of these assessments. First of all, it's not against "the rules," even in theory, assuming by "the rules" you mean the rules of eBay and not "da rules" (which would presumably prevent any activity on eBay unless it's between you and your kid). eBay specifically says sniping is valid, and does not even discourage it: they call it "part of the eBay experience."

As for the charge of being unfair, there are, in fact, many different kinds of bidding behavior in an auction like eBay. I'll simplify it a bit by only describing three categories: Early True Maximum Price Bidders, Snipers, and Nibblers.

The Early True Maximum Bidders, or "Earlies": They submit a bid, generally "early" in the auction (a subjective term, but let's say that means anything earlier than the last day) that is the true maximum amount they want to pay for the item and take their chances. If a later bidder outbids them, they lose: but that's not that bad for them, because they didn't want to pay that much anyway. If later bidder's maximum price is less than theirs, then the later bidder loses and the earlier one wins.
Snipers: They submit a bid near the end of the auction (again, a very subjective term, but let's say in the last few minutes) that is the maximum they want to pay for the item and take their chances. If an earlier bidder outbids them, or another sniper comes along later and outbids them, they lose.
Nibblers: They don't know how much they want to bid, but watch what other people bid and keep bidding more little by little. If you look at the bid history of many auctions, you'll see many nibblers: 10 bids in a row from the same bidder, each one a dollar more than the last. Sometimes you'll see two nibblers in a bidding war (maybe we should call it a "nibbling war"), going up alternately.

I am now a Sniper, but I used to be a Nibbler, so I've been two of the three. Permit me to make a couple of observations:

The primary reason people bid on eBay is to buy something for the lowest price they can. That is, they want something, and they don't want to pay any more than they have to in order to get it. This is exactly the same as walking through a mall and shopping several stores to see which one has the item for less and buying it there.
The only difference between categories Earlies and Snipers is the time frame in which the bidder submits his bid. In both cases, the bidder is submitting a bid for the maximum he wants to pay for the item. In both cases, he takes his chances of being outbid; and in both cases, being outbid is not an altogether bad thing, because he wasn't willing to pay the amount that was bid.
Most people are Nibblers, and they generally Many people consider Snipers bad but Earlies good. Why is this? As we've seen, they're virtually identical in both their intentions and their behavior: the only difference is the time they put their bid in.
Earlies and Snipers are generally very happy with each other, and co-exist rather nicely. Nibblers like Earlies because they can see how much they're bidding; although, in my experience from when I was a Nibbler, having eBay keep telling me I was "outbid" because of Earlies with higher bids than mine is just as frustrating as being outbid by a Sniper. The only group that does not get along is that Nibblers don't like Snipers.
Somebody may object: the Sniping method does not seem very Christian. I would take this charge very seriously. As I am a Christian, all my actions must be guided by Christian principles. But saying that the only Christian way of bidding on eBay is maximizing the seller's profit would mean, conversely, that a Christian seller's goal should be to get me the item for the least money. This is an obvious deadlock. It seems to me that as long as you're honest and above-board with everything, market transactions do follow Christian principles.

I believe that Nibblers hate Snipers not because we are doing anything illegal or immoral, but rather because we ruin their bidding strategy. They have just spent a long period of time bidding and counter-bidding repeatedly, just to come along and find out that since they didn't bid their true maximum amount (the maximum amount they really intended on paying), they "lost" the auction to a Sniper. I could just as easily complain that the Nibblers ruin my bidding strategy because their bidding wars pushes the price up farther than I want to pay. There is a simple solution, of course: either become a Sniper or (if you still think it immoral), an Early. Bid the maximum amount you're willing to pay and see what happens.

If somebody is still thinking "yeah, but Snipers are not fair to the sellers because they don't get as much money as they could," then I have three things to say. First, is my goal on eBay to ensure the seller gets the most money? If so, how does the seller get off not ensuring I get the item for as cheaply as possible? Second, should Nibblers also be obligated to bid as high an amount as possible (and what's more, get another person into the process with you) so that they can drive the price higher to benefit the seller? Why Nibble at all - why not just submit an astronomically-high bid to help out the seller? Finally, why are you on eBay in the first place? Why not just pop down to the mall and buy the item at the first store you come to, regardless of price?

I submit that buyers of all three categories have the same goals: the only difference is that we have different methods that we think will be successful. I won't complain about your bidding method if you don't complain about mine.

Cursing Christians

2007-07-11T14:12:00.000-04:00

How can you say I shouldn't use "curse words"? To be “relevant” to people don't you have to use their language? You wouldn’t go to Aborigines speaking the King’s English - you’d speak their own language. We have to use profanity to reach them!

I have heard that argument many times, and I'm sure you have, too. It's so compelling, so sensitive ... and yet, so wrong. It is true, you must approach Aborigines speaking Aboriginal languages. But we’re dealing with something altogether different here. Aboriginal languages are neither better nor worse than English - they’re just different. But profanity is different: everybody KNOWS inside that it’s wrong, in fact most people use it primarily because they know that.

How do I know? Well, I have a whole lot of years of experience with profanity - around 20, from about age 15 to 35 - and I can tell you two things I've learned. First, all that time I used profanity freely although, and partly because, it was wrong. Inside, I think I was expressing rebellion against those mean ol’ church people. Of course, I didn't say to myself "I wish to rebel against the church and God and so I think I will use many curse words today": I never examined my attitudes, I just did it.

But once God saved me from my sins, I had a complete change in attitude. I knew immediately - I had always known inside, and so do you - that profanity was wrong and God hated it. It was really not any new knowledge God was bringing to me. 1 John 2:7-8 (NIV) expresses very well what we all go through:

Dear friends, I am not writing you a new command but an old one, which you have had since the beginning. This old command is the message you have heard. Yet I am writing you a new command; its truth is seen in him and you, because the darkness is passing and the true light is already shining.

It was an old command I had always known inside. Yet it was a new one as well: I hadn't cared that my speech was dishonoring to God, but now I did. Suddenly, in a moment, it appeared to me as a new command, and one that I knew that I both had to and wanted to follow. This is one of the many reasons I believe the monergists/Calvinists have it right: God took out my uncaring heart of stone and put in a heart of flesh against my will, yet once He did it, it was my will. Before, I freely wanted to keep on sinning and resist God; after, I freely wanted to follow Him. So I stopped it almost immediately, knowing it wasn't something that God wanted me to do.

The second thing I can tell you is that if somebody had come up to me cursing up a blue streak and then said: “but enough about that: let me tell you about Jesus” I’d have immediately sensed the contradiction, the hypocrisy of it all. Although, like most people, I couldn't put into words exactly what “hypocrisy” was, I would have known inside that it was being one thing and acting like another; and the hypocrisy of the cursing Christians would have been evident. It would have been yet another roadblock to faith I threw up.

In fact, what started to bring me around was a couple of guys that I worked with who did not use profanity. They didn't hold it over the rest of us, they didn't treat us like they thought they were better; they just didn't swear. In fact, they were strangely silent when we would profane God's name and use disgusting synonyms for sexual acts and human body parts and excretions. I vividly remember an occasion when I used a particularly vile expression in talking to one of the guys. I had made up that exact expression, and I was rather proud of myself; it pains me to think about now. Anyway, he was rather quiet, and then said softly, "you know, that's kind of disgusting if you think about it." That was nearly 20 years ago, and I can remember it like it was yesterday. I was not born again until almost 10 years later, but it had a definite impact on me. It was a chink appearing in my self-built armor against God.

So, you know what the really sad part is? These cursing Christians - who I have no doubt have deluded themselves that they're cursing for the Kingdom - don’t know that those poor precious unbelieving souls are laughing at them inside and using their profanity as yet another defense that they toss up in their desperate attempt to avoid God. In their "caring" and becoming all things to all men (a verse taken out of context if ever there was one), they are helping the people they say they care about be sped on their way to Hell. It’s truly heart-wrenching.

Why can't I speak Spanish in public?

2007-07-05T10:15:00.000-04:00

I would say that I am to the point in studying Spanish where I am "semi-fluent." That is, I can read most things, I can write and speak tolerably well (i.e. with generally good grammar and I can say almost anything I need to say, although sometimes it takes a bit of thinking to phrase it). For example, I am fluent enough to translate services at my church, and most of the time I think I do an OK job. I can even understand a lot of what people say when I am watching TV. Not everything, and it depends on the subject matter and people, but a lot. Almost my entire Spanish study has been made by listening - to CDs, videos, etc.

So why is it that when I actually try to talk to somebody, I fail so miserably? Not so much in the speaking part, but in the understanding part. I know that I know most of the words and virtually all of the grammar they are using - but, nonetheless, when it comes to actually using Spanish to communicate bi-directionally with people, I fail miserably. Why is that?

I don't think that it's simply that they speak too fast. I can understand fairly rapid speech. Part of the problem is the people don't always speak clearly: they (we all do it) mumble. But the biggest problem, I think, is that I get nervous. I miss something, and then they are standing there waiting for me to respond, and I feel like a complete loser. I live in dread of them switching back to English because I can't hack it; which, of course, they usually do, because their conversational ability in English is almost always way better than mine is in Spanish.

This is on my mind because yesterday we went to a wonderful Bolivian/Argentinian restaurant for lunch. Most of the staff did not speak much English, but seeing that we were gringos I guess they sat us at one of the tables with an English-speaking waitress. So, as I usually do, I worked up the nerve to speak Spanish with her, which she was happy to do. We were doing ok, until I asked her some question, and I didn't understand her answer. Now, there I was in my worst situation: she's said something, expects me to respond, and I don't have a clue. I could ask her to repeat it, but I know from experience I seldom do better on the second time through. She finally gave up on me and repeated it in English.

The thing is, I learned Spanish in the first place because I believe that God has opened a door for me to minister to Latinos in the community. There are many more in recent years, and they need the Gospel as much as we do. What's more, there seems a dearth of solid Spanish sources of Biblical Christianity around. There are Pentacostals, prosperity preachers, Catholics, and now seeker-oriented churches that have ministries to Hispanics, but I don't know of any other solid Bible preaching in Spanish around us. So, if God has called me to it, why aren't I making better progress?

Now, don't get me wrong: I think my progress is pretty good. I have been studying Spanish in total on my own for less than three years. I think that's pretty good for having an understanding of almost the entire grammar and a pretty sizable vocab (I'd guess several thousand words). But I don't seem to be making any additional progress, especially as pertains conversation: honestly, I don't feel any more comfortable conversing with people in Spanish than I did after a year. And, if I can't converse with people, I feel like I am not very useful in helping them into God's kingdom.

It's a bit depressing sometimes. I guess I will keep practicing, keep translating, and hope something happens. Pray for me.

Calvinists don't evangelize!

2007-07-03T10:30:00.001-04:00

"Calvinists don't evangelize. After all, if you're among the elect, God will save you no matter what happens. If you're not, God will send you to Hell regardless of what you do."

If you're a fellow monergist, you have no doubt heard those statements countless times. If you are a synergist (either of the classical Arminian variety or a modern "all means all" Southern Baptist/Calvary Chapelite), you have probably said them. A good friend of mine who is one of the latter said essentially this very thing to me not long ago, and there is a recent comment in Tim Challies' blog saying essentially the same thing. I would like to give an answer to this from the point of view of one monergist.

The crux of the issue is that we need to distinguish between classical Calvinists/monergists and hyper-Calvinists. As I discussed in an earlier entry (although Phil Johnson does a much better job of it than I ever could) they are not at all the same thing. I have generally found that those who are not monergists generally don't make such distinctions - not that nobody does, but that most don't. It's not that surprising, really: people tell me all the time that the kinds of music I favor (classical, jazz, and bluegrass) "all sound the same," though they know next to nothing about the genres. We tend to lump everything we don't really know or understand into one big category: thus black/European/Asian people "all look the same," and as C. S. Lewis pointed out, in most people's minds basically all of history up to about 100 years ago was one big undifferentiated soup of Roman centurions, Vikings, Renaissance men, and Knights.

If you are only planning on having a passing interaction with a subject, I suppose that's reasonable: I don't expect a person who likes to listen to general "classical stuff" as background noise to master the fine distinctions between fugues and canons; similarly, between bebop and post-bop, or between Bill Monroe's instrumentation and that of Flatt and Scruggs. There are only so many hours in the day.

However, if you are going to make an argument maligning another person's love for the lost, it is a serious charge and you really should know what you're talking about. And this is what I find many synergists don't do. Many of them take a sketchy understanding of the monergist's understanding of the secret will of God, and then they extrapolate it to be his total belief about the action of God in history. Furthermore, they then assume the monergist will ignore the clear teaching of Scripture to evangelize the world in favor of his understanding of God's secret will.

For that is what we are really being accused of: ignoring God's clear command to evangelize in favor of our understanding of God's secret will. This is no small accusation. However, if you think about it, does it really make any sense? Is somebody willing to tell me to my face that we monergists are willing to ignore God's clear commands and follow what we think (even based on good evidence) that God is planning on doing to the unregenerate in the end? If one is going to take that tack, why not do as the extremist Muslims to, and kill the infidels? After all, God is just going to send them to hell in the end anyway, right? One might object that we don't know somebody is non-elect, only that they are not yet regenerated (yet synergists make this same mistake when they facetiously ask us "why don't you just preach to the elect?") But let's say that we somehow did know who was elect and who was not. In principle, why not kill them now, since we know God is planning on reprobating them anyway?

The answer should be obvious: because God never told us to. He told us to love our neighbor and preach the Gospel. And ignoring what you are clearly told for what you think God will do in the end is not only extremely foolish but sinful.

On the two wills in God

2007-07-02T18:33:00.001-04:00

Perhaps you have read John Piper's excellent essay, Are There Two Wills in God?. If you have not, I highly recommend it since I will be restating parts of it and building on other parts of it here.

I take as my starting place that both monergists (as usual, the term I prefer to Calvinist) and synergists (in place of Arminians) believe that there are two wills in God, a revealed will and a secret will. (If you are a synergist and you don't think you believe God has two wills, please read Piper's essay. I will be supporting the point more below, but digesting that essay is very helpful for clear thinking on the subject.) Sometimes these are called prescriptive will and eternal will.

Nevertheless, I believe that there is further agreement in that both monergists and synergists agree on God's revealed will: that God loves all men, wishes (in some sense) for them to be saved, and that He commands us to share the Gospel to all men and invite them to repent, believe, and be saved. He also reveals that anybody who hears the Gospel and believes will be saved. Both monergists and synergists agree on these points, since they are clearly laid out in the Bible.

The difference only occurs in what God's secret will is, that is, the basis on which people are saved in God's eternal plan. This difference is because the Bible does not lay this out in a systematic fashion: you have to piece together evidence from many different Bible verses, and people differ on the interpretation. However, again there is some agreement. Both agree (I hope) that God's secret will is primarily to give Himself glory. It is true, synergists do not normally talk in terms of God's glory: they typically talk, like C. S. Lewis did (definitely a synergist, a pretty pure Arminian) about God's upholding men's free will because He did not want an army of puppets. But I hope that the underlying unstated reason is that they believe giving men ultimate control over their own salvation brings God glory in some way.

The crux of the difference between monergists and synergists is what it is that gives God the most glory. The monergist says it is that He is demonstrated to be both merciful (through those He elects) and just (through those He reprobates). For the current purpose, I don't think it matters so much whether God actively reprobates the lost, or simply allows them to perish in their sins: the point is that God could have saved them, but He doesn't, and the fact that He saves some and not others brings Him glory. After all, better knowledge of God brings Him glory, and understanding that he elects some and not others is better knowledge of Him. This is true even for those who are lost: though their will continues to rebel against God, at least the flag of truth is planted within them (as Lewis also noted), even if they don't do anything else with it.

On the other hand, the synergist says that God gets the most glory by allowing man his free will when it comes to salvation. And I can understand that, in a way. Why shouldn't it give God glory? After all, it gives men glory (in their own way) when they respect the free will of others. The problem here is really the same one I mentioned in my last post about the "Free Will Song": many of the standards that apply in human-to-human relationships do not apply in God-to-human ones. It is wrong for a human being to demand worship from another: not so between men and God. One human should not be a slave to another: but Paul said that he was a slave to Jesus Christ.

Similarly, men should give each other free will: but God's understanding is so much above ours the same does not apply to God, and in two ways. He is infinite, of course, while we are finite. But just as importantly, we are sinful and He is not. Our wills are free, but they are enslaved to their own sin. Thus, we neither can nor wish to respond in faith to God. He could have let us go according to our own wills: but then nobody could be saved. It's only because He does NOT let us go according to our own wills that any of us are saved.

I should mention a point once made by a synergist I was talking to (a very intelligent young man, very knowledgeable especially given that he was only 17 years old). He agreed with me that he also believed in the idea of two wills in God; but then he made the comment "But in my understanding the two wills do not contradict each other." We didn't get a chance to hash that out, but I have thought about his position. I think he was saying that in the situation of the people that God reprobates, His two wills are in conflict with each other: the revealed will saying "save the person" and the secret will saying "condemn the person."

It was an interesting comment. It is true, one will says "save" and the other says "don't save." But if the results weren't different at least in some cases, there would really be no reason to speak of there being two wills: there would only be one will. Still, I think it fails as a support for synergism, and that in two ways. First, the two are not really in conflict at a high level: God's revealed will is to save, and His secret will is to bring Himself glory. They are really dealing with two different issues. The only way they can be said to be in conflict is with regards to that particular person.

Second, doesn't the synergist have the same problem? In the synergist's view, God wants to save the person (revealed will), but not wanting to save the person so as not to interfere with his free will (secret will). Again, we have an apparent conflict as regards that one individual person. So if the monergist's version of God's two wills has a "contradiction," so does the synergist's.

The Free Will Song

2007-06-29T12:56:00.000-04:00

There has been much talk and guffaws among my monergist brothers and sisters (mostly brothers) about the Free Will Song, as performed by the Pensacola Christian College singers. Many with sophisticated musical tastes will bash its pathetic chord structures and melody line and sickly sweet lyrics. Perhaps I don't have sophisticated musical tastes (although I have made a fair study of Beethoven/Bach/Mozart, along with musical theory and composition, etc.) but I rather like it as a song. I think it's pretty, if a bit saccharine. So kick me out of the music academy.

But though I am a musician, that's not what I want to talk about. I am more concerned with the words and ideas behind it. First, as a monergist, I obviously reject the free willism that forms the basis for the song. This is the main basis, I hope, upon which most monergists have rejected the song, and rightly so. God doesn't, counter to what the lyrics say, let you "use your own will." For that, I am eternally grateful (literally!) If God let me use my own will, I'd still be what I was for 35 years of my life: not the most evil person imaginable, but with no interest in following God's ways or seeking after God, dead in my sins and trespasses, and being quite satisfied with it. I couldn't find God, as the saying goes, for the same reason a thief couldn't find a policeman.

However, I cannot bring myself to mock either the song nor the young people performing it, as I have heard many do. The young people singing it clearly have a devotion and a zeal for God that I wish many of us monergists had. (Don't think I am saying "Calvinists don't evangelize." Down, boy.) Also, although I strongly disagree with the philosophical presupposition behind the song ("[God] will let you use your own will"), I cannot help but be struck by the beauty of the idea. As I have listened to this song multiple times, I get a clear picture of God as a gentleman (in either the medieval or modern sense), his every action governed by Chivalry. God wouldn't "force Himself" on anybody, I can hear them thinking. In a certain light, this is a beautiful idea.

Of course, it is vitally important to remember that Satan would appear as an angel of light, which means nothing if it doesn't mean his appearance would be attractive, would strike us as beautiful. On the other hand, Christ had no beauty that we should desire Him. The idea that the beautiful=the good is, I believe, a pagan Greek idea that has no place in Christianity. So, just because the idea is beautiful is no reason to accept it as truth.

In fact, Chivalry does not apply in the relations between God and man at all. Chivalry between two humans, where they both are equal in essence (in that they are both made in God's image, and they are both sinful according to the flesh), is an excellent idea, and one that we should all strive to follow. But there is nothing analogous in God. God does not have a sin nature, His every thought is not directed towards evil, His feet are not swift to shed blood as ours are.

So, the idea of God being chivalrous to us is an attractive one to me, no less than to the precious young men and women singing that song. However, it's one that the Bible forces me to reject.

Two ways of preaching about sex

2007-06-28T08:10:00.000-04:00

Have you noticed that every church out there seems to be preaching about sex nowadays? Some do it quietly, while some do it by taking out billboards talking about myc**ppysexlife.com. Churches with trendy names like "Next Level Church," "Lifepoint," etc., are all talking about sex, like it's something they have just discovered. Somehow I get this feeling that God knew about sex before, and - shockingly to some people - Christians have always known about it and practiced it too. (I wonder if some of these people ever wondered where those big families of fundamentalists came from?)

Every church out there claims to base their sex sermons on Song of Solomon, which is a good thing in itself. Song of Solomon is in the Bible, and it's about sex. However, based on what I hear (and it is not surprising given the M.O. of many of these churches), the sermons often seem to be less about Song of Solomon and more about personal experiences relating to sex. I submit there is a vast difference in subject matter, and in how it affects people.

Let me submit two examples of how churches might approach the subject. First is from seeker-oriented Lifepoint church (as usual, I don't mean this pejoratively, but descriptively: I think this is how they'd describe themselves). The second is from the church my family attends, Cornerstone Chapel. Both of these links will take you to the page on each church's respective web sites where the MP3's of the sermons are available: I invite you to listen and judge for yourself. I should note that both churches claim to be preaching on the text of Song of Solomon: Lifepoint because they decided to do a series on sex, and Cornerstone because my pastor preaches straight through from Genesis to Revelation and that's the point we're up to.

What I heard from Lifepoint was discussion of exactly two Bible verses - neither of them out of Song of Solomon, by the way, although other sermons in the series may have used a verse or two from that book - taking a total of approximately 2.5 minutes. I say "approximately" because I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt: I include any discussion even remotely related to the Biblical texts in this category. In addition to this 2.5 minutes of Biblical exposition was over 34 minutes of personal stories and “Men are from Mars/Women from Venus” type self-help advice, mixed in with some unfortunate sexual innuendos and jokes, and apparently a “sex picture” on the big screen. Like most churches of this type I've seen, the pastor brings his wife up on stage for part of the presentation: frankly, the conversation with his wife on stage struck me as voyeuristic at points. The expression TMI comes to mind. I heard a few generic references to God.

Compare with my own pastor’s approach: two sermons of solid exposition on Song of Solomon. Did he talk about sex? Yes. Was it casual and informal, even occasionally humorous? Yes. But it was two 40 minute sessions of solid exposition on the Biblical texts. What's more, my pastor actually followed the outline of the book in his sermons: the first sermon was on chapters 1-3 (courtship) and the second one chapters 4-8 (marriage). Since marriage customs of the ancient near east are not familiar to many people, he also spent some time describing these. But, it was two sermons with no sexual innuendos, steeped with God’s purposes, God’s approach, and God’s point of view on sex.

Now, a lot of what Lifepoint preached is good advice, no doubt. No doubt, some people will hear via billboards or newspaper announcements (which are not necessarily bad in themselves), that the church is holding a service on sex, be curious, and came in the door - at least as long as the sex series lasts. But, if I were an unbeliever come into such a service, I would get the idea that this is a sex self-help group and not a church. I might walk out making a resolution to improve myself, but I would have no reason to Biblically repent of my sins, because I have never been confronted with the truth of them and the full Gospel.

If you think the difference merely one of style, I respectfully disagree. One sermon is personal stories and self-help advice; the other is solid teaching from the Word of God. And it is my fervent belief that only the Word of God can truly convert anybody - no self-help sermon ever will.

Note: I posted an earlier form of this note as a comment on Joe Carr's ru-mi-na-tions blog. I strongly disagree with Joe on certain things, but I really appreciate his heart for the lost. I wanted to expand on my thoughts here. I hope this is not violating some rule in blogdom. If it is, I can only plead that I am new at this blogging thing and ask forgiveness of whoever I've insulted.

Are "seeker" churches semi-Pelagian?

2007-06-26T10:15:00.000-04:00

In thinking about "seeker sensitive" churches, it seems to me that they would be best described as semi-Pelagian in the fullest, original sense. Sometimes people who consider themselves "Calvinist" in some sense throw around terms like "semi-Pelagian" simply meaning "synergistic" (as opposed to monergistic). I suppose most know what they mean when they use the term: but it's probably better to use terms according to their widely-accepted definition rather than a private definition which your listener may or may not share.

So let's Define Our Terms! I am using "semi-Pelagianism" to mean what I believe is the original definition: that it is necessary for humans to make the first step toward God and then God will complete salvation. I think you can make a scale of "Christian" beliefs about soteriology as follows. Note that I am using these terms for the purpose of classification only: I generally avoid using terms in direct reference to people because it's not profitable. I am also not using these terms pejoratively, but rather descriptively. I am not saying a semi-Pelagian person or even a Pelagian is "good" or "bad." I may reject them as holding a non-Biblical theology, but I am not making a value judgment on the people involved. Many of them are probably better and holier than me.

Pelagianism: It's up to us to want to follow God and save ourselves. This is generally considered non-Christian, being rejected by virtually all church fathers and the church since. Since they completely reject God's sovereignty, they would obviously reject all five points of Calvinism.
Semi-Pelagianism: We take the first step towards God, and then God saves us. This is probably on the border of what would classically be called "Christian." They would probably also reject the five points.
Arminianism: God takes the first step to save us, then we have to accept (once and on a continuing basis for the rest of our lives) salvation. This is common in many types of churches, including Methodist and Nazarene. They accept God's sovereignty, but still reject all five points of Calvinism.
Semi-Arminianism (my term): God takes all the steps to save us except the last one, the actual exercise of faith, which we have to do ourselves. This is common in "fundamentalist" churches such as the southern Baptists, but also many non-denominational churches and seminaries. They often call themselves "two-", "three-", or "four-point" Calvinists, generally rejecting Limited Atonement.
Semi-Calvinism (my term): Similar to semi-Arminianism, except they generally accept Limited Atonement and divine election. However, they reject Irresistible Grace, the idea being that God elects us, but He gives us the free will to reject Him. They might typically call them four-point Calvinists. I have seen a number of these in Calvary Chapel.
Calvinism/monergism: Accept God's sovereignty in everything, and thus all five points of Calvinism. I fall into this category.
Hyper-Calvinism: Really a misnomer, because they do not follow Calvinistic/monergistic ideas, chief among them being that man has a real will and is thus responsible for his own sin. Rather, they have a fatalistic view of God. God elects us (or not), and we have absolutely nothing to do with it, no will of our own; thus no guilt for our own sin.

So, let's consider where "seeker" churches fit on this scale. Their whole purpose and method is to attract people's wills, to make themselves attractive to people. People's wills (they hope) will be turned to God. Once they get people to stay for enough services and perhaps take some classes, God's spirit will finally work on the people's hearts and convert them. I contend that this is semi-Pelagianism in a pretty pure form. People make their own decision to stay because of the cool music or "relevant" preaching, and eventually they get close enough to where God can save them.

Again, I am not saying that I am holier or better than these preachers, nor that I care about the lost more than they do. However, I would say that their methods are unbiblical, and simply do not work if the goal is to "make disciples of all nations." They may fill the churches; they may give help people live happier lives; they may be better for people than if they hung around in bars. (Same idea as the biker bar in my town that has a sign on the window that says Better Here Than Across the Street, referring to the courthouse across the street.)

But I contend that they do not truly convert men's hearts. Only the Spirit of God, working through the Word of God, can do that.

Worldly churches do not convert anybody

2007-06-25T10:16:00.001-04:00

I have been thinking about this posting on oldtruth.com. Many in the seeker movement believe that you must lure people into the church with cool music and videos and then God will work on their hearts. It is my firm conviction that many who say that to save the world the church must look like the world are well-meaning - I really do respect their desire to reach their unsaved neighbors, and indeed wish that all reformed believers were as zealous - but just as "zeal without knowledge" (Romans 10:2) is not good, I believe that many of them really do not know whereof they speak. How many of these seeker/emergent folks are anywhere from 20-somethings to 40-somethings and have spent virtually their entire lives in the church? I think that most (not 100%, but I believe the vast majority) have lived in somewhat sheltered Christian communities their entire lives, and are, quite naturally, reacting against both perceived and real problems in the church.

As someone who was on the outside for my entire adult life until God sovereignly chose to save me at the age of 35, I can tell you that I would not have been taken in by worldly music, videos, and self-help sermons, nor by cussing preachers. Believe me, I knew cussing plenty well: my friends and I did enough cussing for all the cussing preachers out there put together.

While I might have been willing to attend such a worldly church - for awhile anyway, until I got bored or had something better to do on Sunday mornings - what brought me to Christ was several people who, without being judgmental of me, were different. Although on most occasions they didn't rebuke my profanity, they were always strangely silent when we were using it. I'll always remember one guy who made one single, soft-spoken remark after one particularly vile thing I said: "That's kind of gross if you think about it." He probably does not remember saying that, but 20 years later I still remember it clearly.

What converts people? The Holy Spirit working through the word of God and examples of changed lives around them. Not churches copying the world.

One reason that I am a Calvinist/ Monergist

2007-06-08T15:21:00.000-04:00

I've been thinking, in response to the posting of my friend Barry over on Strange Baptist Fire, about what to do with Scriptures that appear to contradict one another. Especially on my mind (because of the discussion over there) is the age-old question: Calvinism or Arminianism? The names change over time (Augustinianism vs. Pelagianism, monergism vs. synergism), but the question remains substantially the same. [Note: I added the word "substantially" because I know that Pelagianism, semi-Pelagianism, synergism, and Arminianism are not identical. However, the key idea, that we ultimately choose our eternal destiny of our own free will, remains.] Does God choose us, or do we ultimately choose Him?

There seem to be some Scripture verses that are hard to reconcile on this subject. For example, (a) you have verses (actually, I would submit, almost the whole of Scripture) that say God elects and we don't. (b) You also have verses that clearly uphold the lostness of men in sin. (c) You have verses that indicate that man is held responsible for his own sin. Finally, (d) you have verses that say that any who will come, let him come to Christ and they shall be saved. What to do with these?

You can uphold only #3 and #4, which means that you must find ways of explaining away #1 and #2, usually by redefining them. Thus, you become a full Arminian or worse (semi-Pelagian, Pelagian, etc.) This includes the folks who say "All means all, and that's all it means," etc.
You can uphold only #1 and #2, which means you must find ways of redefining #3 and #4. Thus, you become a hyper-Calvinist.
You can uphold #1 through #4, and try to find some way of understanding them that make sense in the overall frame of mind of Scripture. This requires recognizing that God is God and we are not: we are both finite and sinful. Thus, there will be things that we cannot ultimately understand 100%.

The third option, I submit, is what monergists/Calvinists/Augustinians have taken. God DOES elect - because it's stated clearly, and that's what the whole Bible is about. Man IS lost in his sins and trespasses, because that's what the Bible says. Man IS responsible for his own sin, because we want to sin. (Even C.S. Lewis admitted that you even if you do not accept original sin, surely there are SOME sins that we could avoid committing, yet we commit them anyway.) Every time we sin we do it for one reason only: because we want to do it more than we want to keep God's laws.

Finally, anybody who hears and wants to accept the Gospel CAN freely accept it. But how can all these things be (echoing Nicodemus)? I submit that the monergist understanding of a will held down or "fettered" by sin (as expressed by Jonathan Edwards) best explains it. Anybody can, in theory, accept the free gift of Christ's sacrifice; but because our wills are fettered by sin, only those who have been regenerated by God WILL accept it.

Is the gospel offer then not a real offer? Not at all. Anybody who is willing, can accept it. You may have read the thoroughly bogus bus stop analogy where Nelson Price argues against Calvinism. Well, I have news for you, Dr. Price: your "missionary couple who with zeal have served Christ all their lives" and your "persons who from youth have loved and ministered in Christ’s name" ARE among the elect, and they have proved it by their actions. Of course, some people may be missionaries though they are not actually regenerated: God knows their hearts, not us. But, if those missionaries truly did it because they loved Jesus Christ, then that is the de facto evidence that they are in fact saved/regenerated/one of the elect. The bus stop analogy may be a "graphic understood by many Baptists regarding predestination," but it's so poor it should not be used unless one is arguing against hyper-Calvinism.

Thoughts on blended worship

2007-05-31T09:50:00.001-04:00

In addition to being a musician, I am a sometimes-worship leader. One of the things that often comes up in worship leading circles is the question of "blended worship style" - that is, using both modern Praise and Worship songs as well as hymns in a service. Some people think it's the greatest thing ever, and some people say it does not work. I've thought about it, and it seems to me that for some churches the correct answer may be the former, while for others the answer may be the latter.

Which group your church might fall into can be discovered, I believe, by asking yourself one simple question: why do I want to do blended worship here? I think that there will be essentially two possible answers to that question:

Because the members of my church appreciate old hymns for their theological depth and majesty, but they also appreciate modern Praise and Worship for the intimacy with God the best modern songs represent.
Second, because some members of my church only enjoy old hymns or think them proper for use in church ("hymns" generally being loosely defined as any hymn proper, or a gospel song written before about 1960), while other members only enjoy modern P&W songs and think hymns are stuffy and boring. One is tempted to say that the former group can also be described as people who want "songs that I heard in church when I was growing up" and the latter can also be described as "anything BUT the songs I heard in church growing up," but I'll leave that on the side for now.

Anyway, if your church falls into the first category, then I'd say go ahead and try blended worship. Even if some people prefer one type of music or the other, I would bet that they will be satisfied with both. My church is very much like this, consisting mostly of young people who prefer the modern songs, but many appreciate the old ones; with a non-trivial population of people (often, but not exclusively, older) for whom the sentiments work the other way round. Prepare to have people tell you how much they appreciate the mix of music, especially if you can pair up newer and older songs, building on common themes.

However, if your church falls into the latter category, then you will likely have a difficult time with blended worship. It will probably make neither group happy; the old song lovers (again, not necessarily the same group as chronologically older people) will complain about the lack of theological depth of modern songs (and let's face it, many modern songs do have this problem), and the new song partisans will complain that the boring hymns are "wrecking" their worship time. It seems to me that a worship time wrecked by a song that does not match one's personal taste is a very weak one indeed.

Addendum: I am not addressing situations where the church members only think psalm-based hymns appropriate because of the Regulative Principle of Worship. That is an interesting question, and one that I will tackle in the future, but it does not apply to this posting. For now, I am talking of groups who prefer older hymns or newer worship songs for stylistic reasons only.

New sound - the ruler rules

2006-10-18T13:30:00.000-04:00

This instrument is muy chévere. I keep discovering cool new things you can do with it. As you probably know, there is not a whole lot out there on the Internet about the cajón, which is a big part of the reason I started this blog. But, I found this site from Kotz, who makes an instrument with a very cool logo and which I'm sure sounds great. Anyway, I saw how Kotzen attaches those "slap pads" to the corners. I don't imagine he'd sell me slap pads by themselves, but I started thinking about how I could do the same thing. Obviously I could put similar little plywood plates on the corner. (He says these "slap pads" are patent pending, though I can't find it on a patent search. I wouldn't sell them though.) But I decided to see what else I could try.

I found a wooden ruler that my kids have. One nice thing about this ruler is that it's not quite straight when you look at it from above: it's a little wavy. That may not be great if you're using it as a rule, but it is if you want to use it like I am. I can hold it against the front with one hand and hit it with the other. This is nice because it is removable when you don't want the sound, but you have to hold Publish Postit in place with your other hand. From my limited experience with it so far, this may be "not a problem" or it may be a problem, depending on the kind of rhythm you're playing. If you're playing with rapid alternating low-high tones with both hands, it's kind of hard to hold the ruler because no hand really stays in one place very long.

Research continues. I think it's promising, and it reinforces what has to be one of the coolest things about playing the cajón - the reactions you get. You're going to play a what - a wooden box? I pulled it out the other weekend (I still have to get around to putting up an entry about that) and people were looking at it like, what is that? One guy said "is that a speaker?" So, now I get to play a speaker plus a ruler.

Primera vez con otros músicos! y more about Spanglish

2006-10-11T00:04:00.000-04:00

I just returned from a men´s retreat with my church and got the opportunity to play with a bunch of other musicians for the first time. I play with my son (on guitar) whenever I can but this was the first time I could play with a grupo de músicos. Voy a contar the story in a later post. For now, here are a couple of resources for Spanglish that I found and enjoyed.

Diccionario del Espanglish: http://members.tripod.com/~nelson_g/spanglish.html
Parte de Don Quixote en el Espanglish: http://www.cuadernoscervantes.com/art_40_quixote.html
Spanglish Computer terms: http://www.esi2.us.es/~jon/spanglist.html

And wikipedia, of course, has an article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanglish

The wikipedia article is interesting to me because it delimits different types of what one might call "Spanglish." I had noticed this myself: the above "Diccionario" for example, mostly consists of one type of "Spanglish," English words that were taken more or less directly into Spanish ("parkear", "watchar", "breka", etc.) The other type of "Spanglish," as linguists call it "code-switching," is what I enjoy intermixing real English and real Spanish words in the same sentence. Although I prefer the latter type, I can't find myself condemning the former ("parkear") type of Spanglish: we do it in English all the time, of course - words and expressions like "bon vivant," "tout de suite," "aficionado," "calaboose" (ok, so that's a really old word - I still like it), etc. Nobody condemns it when English speakers do it, but suddenly it's a bad thing when Spanish speakers do it. It seems to me that it's just another example of people who think they're smarter than the rest of us, and who decide what's allowable (better yet, fashionable) and what isn't.

In fact, thinking about it, the only place that I draw the line is when lazy anglophones make up the bogus Spanish words; when they say "argumento" when they should really say "discusión", or "carpeta" instead of "alfombra." Languages should be able to change, but let those who really know the language do it.

Unfortunately, wikipedia omits the best reason to speak the "code switching" Spanglish, from what I've found: it's fun, and it's easier than speaking full time in a language that's not your native one. I've been part of Spanglish conversations with people who spoke English probably as well as I speak Spanish, each of us switching back and forth rather than trying to remember words we have trouble with. It works well.

Peruvian or Flamenco Cajón?

2006-10-07T14:43:00.000-04:00

I am a bit confused about the different types of cajones. I hear the "Peruvian" described as being basically a simple box, and the "Flamenco" described as having the "snare" mechanism inside. Está bien.

Entonces, I find this site, which calls the Meinl CAJ3 (mine) a "Peruvian cajón with a built-in sizzle effect." I thought that if it had the "sizzle effect" it was by definition a flamenco cajón. Here, for example, is a cajón that pretty much confirms that impression. It has a "peruvian" side and a "flamenco" side on only the latter has a string/snare. That is a beautiful instrument, by the way. The guy who makes them and sells them on ebay, cesar233, certainly looks like he knows what he's doing.

Una historia que menciona el cajón

2006-10-07T11:41:00.000-04:00

Aquí esta a story about life in the "high neighborhoods" (Barrios Altos) de Lima, Peru. It is not primarily about the cajón, but it mentions the cajón in several places. Here, for example is one paragraph:

En los Barrios Altos no faltaba una voz melodiosa que, al son de alguna guitarra y un cajón, entonara los valses de Felipe Pinglo, Chabuca Granda, Félix Pasache, Mario Cavagnaro o Augusto Polo Campos. Los viernes y sábados eran netamente criollos en Los Barrios Altos, aunque cuando se trataba de entonar un vals peruano, cualquier día de la semana era igualmente bueno.

"In the High Neighborhoods there was always a melodious voice that, to the sound of some guitar and cajón, would sing the waltzes of Felipe Pinglo, Chabuca Granda, Félix Pasache, Mario Cavagnaro or Augusto Polo Campos. Fridays and Saturdays were clearly "native" (actually, criollo, a word that refers to a style and culture relating to native-born children of immigrants; "creole" is the equivalent in English, though I think most people don't really know what it means - I certainly didn't) in the High Neighborhoods, although when they tried to sing a Peruvian waltz, any day of the week was equally good."

Interesting reading for a sentido del cajón peruano.

Poniendo un micrófono antes del cajón

2006-10-06T13:59:00.000-04:00

Este sitio is muy interesante. For those who don't read Spanish - who are also probably annoyed at me for publishing in Spanglish - he first discusses three of the major cajón tones (agudo=high, grave=low, medio=in between, the last of which I had not so far thought of as a distinct tone). He spends the rest of the posting talking about how you should place a microphone for a cajon to emphasize one or the other, and the writer's experience with doing it in different gigs. I was wondering about this very question this morning watching the DVD, although I was not searching for this information. Call it a bit of google serendipity (¿como se dice en español? ¿serendipidad por google?) but it popped up when i was searching for "pollito asado" - the method of playing the low tone with the hand in a cupped position, reminiscent of slapping a breast of chicken on the grill (hence the name, "grilled chicken"). That search also turns up a child's game, so I wonder if that's where los peruanos got the name.

Translation provided by request.

Playing the Dashboard

2006-10-06T05:49:00.000-04:00

Bueno. Este instrumento is a lot of fun to play. No lo puedo creer. I just learned a new pattern, which I have been practicing all over the place. When I say "en todas partes", I mean exactly that - on my desk, on my car's dashboard, etc. One of the muy chévere things about percussion, I am just learning, is that you can play it anywhere, not just where you actually have your instrument. Claro, el cajón es muy fácil llevar conmigo - pero en el carro, sitting at a traffic light, I can play the dashboard or even my leg. If I had a dog, I'd probably be playing the drum on his back. Some day I'll probably play on one of my kids' heads. (Don't think I'm cruel - I don't mean actually playing loud enough so it hurts them. Heck, I play on my own head now. It's just running through practice in the hand positions. I used to "practice" clarinet in the same way - running my fingers up and down on a flat surface.)

Of course, the idea of "practicing" instruments when you don't actually have them with you is not new - remember the "Think System" of Professor Harold Hill of the "Music Man" movie? - but I am just realizing how much better it works cuando toque percusión., because you can actually hear yourself play to some extent. Playing desktop clarinet, or steering wheel guitar does not work nearly as well.

I would like to describe the patterns as I learn them, as a possible aid to help somebody else who's just learning as I am. Unfortunately, I have never seen a Latin percussion tab format. Vamos a probarlo:

-!-1-+-2-+-3-+-4-+-!
L!-R-----L-----R---!
H!---L-R---R-L---L-!

L is the "low tone" and H is the "high tone." (I guess I could add others - heel, side, etc.) R and L are which hand to play with. I hope that makes sense. It doesn't really capture the picture I see in my mind of how you play this. That's another thing I am realizing about playing percussion - the "picture" I get of how I'm playing. With most other instruments, it's mostly by feel, although as I think about it, I get a picture of them too. For example, I get a very clear picture in my mind of a mandolin fingerboard, and the shapes of not only the chords but also where the notes are. I've thought before that it kind of "feels like" a piano keyboard has been superimposed over the mandolin strings, with the piano keys at various fret position/string combinations. It's not that I actually see a piano keyboard, of course - more just sort of a feeling, kind of like a dream.

I'd be interested to hear about how others picture drum patterns in their heads, or any other sugerencias for learning patterns. It seems there has to be some kind of system people have - how else do you remember all these different patterns?

Me duelen las manos

2006-10-04T22:48:00.000-04:00

Supongo que all Latin percussionists know esto - pero my hands hurt. Mucho. As in, I can play for just a minute or two, then caramba! My hands are killing me. And it's not just pain in the músculos - eso podría aguantar. Me parece que es algo más dañoso - mis articulaciones y huesos, joints and bones. Se siente como voy a dañar mis dedos. Playing conga drum or the bongos, por lo menos the head is somewhat soft - cuero duro, pero más suave que la madera. I know I can play with the brushes (¿escobillas?) or even drumsticks (palos?), but most of the time people just play solamente usando las manos. Es posible que pueda endurecer them up - por ejemplo, when I get a chance to play the guitar regularly, my fingertips get great calluses on them. I guess all I can do is hope that my palms - especially the area around the joints - toughen up in that same way. Otherwise, I just can't imagine how much damage years of this is going to do to my hands.

Cualquier sugerencias están bienvenidas.

Welcome

2006-10-04T13:23:00.000-04:00

Well, this is my first blog ever. It is named "El Nuevo Cajoneador" because that's what I am - a new cajón player. About a year ago, I saw Freddie Colloca and his band play, and saw the cajón for the first time. I immediately fell in love with it, and have been pondering getting one ever since. Recently, I got a little extra money, so I recided to take the plunge. I just bought my cajón, a Meinl CAJ3MB-M. I also bought the Book/DVD Aprende el Cajón Flamenco and started going through the exercises.

I will try and keep up this blog as I learn to play this beautiful new instrument. I plan to put in problems I have, things I discover, good music that features the cajón, etc. There don't seem to be many resources on the net for cajón. This is my first percussion instrument ever (though I play a number of others) so it will be an interesting adventure. Whether I will be able to keep it up in English and Spanish, I don´t know. Maybe deba escribirlo en espanglish. Puede ser que sea easier and more divertido.

Bueno, este es mi primero blog. Es llamado "El Nuevo Cajoneador¨porque eso es lo que estoy. Hace un año que vi a Freddie Colloca y su grupo tocando, y vi el cajón por primera vez. Inmediatamente me anamoré de él, y desde aquel entonces estaba pensando adquirirlo. Hace un poco, conseguí un poco de dinero, así que dedecí arriesgarme. Acabo de comprar mi cajón, un Meinl CAJ3MB-M. I También compré el libro-DVD Aprende el Cajón Flamenco y empecé a practicarlo.

Voy a tratar de mantener este blog mientras aprendo a tocar este nuevo instrumento tan bello. Parece que no hay muchos recursos en la red sobre el cajón. Es mi primer instrumento de percusión (aúnque toco otros instrumentos) - va a estar una aventua muy interesante. Si voy a poder mantenerlo en inglés y español, eso no lo sé. Maybe deba escribirlo en espanglish. Puede ser que sea easier and more divertido.