I guess I do have this.
SCENE ONE: anxious parents pace back and forth in a hospital waiting room. Their only child fights for life in surgery. Word will come back at any moment. They alternately hold on to each other, and clutch their stomachs, sick with worry and care.
In comes their faithful shepherd, Pastor D. Zaster. His advent is preceded by a happy whistle and accompanied by a cheery smile."Why so gloomy?" he chirps. "God is sovereign! His purposes are sure and certain. Anything that happens today or tomorrow is just a little blip, a road bump, on the way to Christ's Kingdom. And your child? What's one child against the ages of eternity? Dead, alive, Christ is risen and the Gospel is glorious. Really, to fret is to disbelieve! Cheer up! You're making far too much of far too little!"
Our verdict? Jerk.
SCENE TWO: An anxious American expresses his fears and concerns about today's presidential election. He knows that the results will have an impact on abortion, religious liberty, national security, as well as all the matters of concern highlighted in Jeremiah 29:1ff. Romans 13:1ff., 1 Tim. 2:1ff., and 1 Pet. 2:14.
In comes Famous Religionist, chirping "Why so gloomy? God is sovereign! His purposes are sure and certain. Anything that happens today or tomorrow is just a little blip, a road bump, on the way to Christ's Kingdom. And your nation? What's one little country against the ages-long rise and fall of kingdoms? Ruined, flourishing, Christ is risen and the Gospel is glorious. Really, to fret is to disbelieve! Cheer up! You're making far too much of far too little!"
Our verdict? Deeeep. Thoughtful. Helpful. Nuanced. Positively Godicocious. Let's give him a conference so he can tell us more.My verdict? Er, well, let's say it isn't any of that.
Before you want to tell me that a pivotal moment in American history such as this isn't worth getting worked up about, you go talk Jeremiah out of writing Lamentations and then get back to me.
And anyone who still thinks that weaving airy theologizations and rationalizations for his own blithe detachment is great and wise and godly... well, just stay well away from anyone I care about when tragedy looms.
We live in the day when Men Without Chests are carried to fame and glory by adoring masses; and any hint of criticism, any attempt at accountability for failure, any call to something better and more truly Biblical and godly and manly is punished by scolding and shaming and shunning. They are the enablers, without whom the fops would be invisible.
Ah well. Tomorrow we'll know more about what Americans have chosen to reward.
And if the news is bad, we'll have to endure the deep, nuanced, above-it-all essays from Job's friends, and the adoring sighs of their fanboys.
64 comments:
Amen. Psalm 119:126
So . . . the nation . . . is your baby? OK. Hmmmm
So now know the answer to the unspoken question: it took just two comments.
Plus: one-star hater is a Roman Catholic and a Democrat. Profile grows.
one-star hater is clearly Phil Johnson trying to monkey-wrench this blog since he can't post here anymore. You cannot replace Prince Charming with the 7 Dwarves.
The Pastor of D. Zaster is the best detail of this post, but not the best part of this post.
At the very least: If Obama w...wi...wins, his enablers have forfeited the right to complain when he repeats what he's been doing the last four years.
Let's just say I am self-censoring a response to that which would sink my name even deeper on the black list.
But yes, jmb, morally you are absolutely right.
"We are drivelling dwarfs, content with the small height to which we have attained, forgetful of the steeps which tower above our heads. Up! Christian, up!" CHS
Don't know if DJP's medical story was an allusion to Obamacare, but I just got back from the local Post Office (I've worked for the Postal Service on two different occasions). After dealing with an inept, bumbling window clerk, all I could think of as I walked out is, "And we want the government running health care?" You might not have buyer's remorse over the price of stamps and window service for your packages but you certainly will when it involves the lives of you and your loved ones.
Isn't Jeremiah's angst about Israel's fate mostly tied to her covenant relationship with God? How could God's covenant people be so unfaithful and how dreadful is their Father's heavenly discipine! I fail to see how this coresponds well to America.
Sometimes I need to remind myself that what is true and even helpful to me to remember is not hlalways helpful as the sole comment on a situation.
I keep reminding myself that Christ, who was King during the Reagan administration, is still King during the Obama administration. But I say this to buttress my faith because I am worked up - very worked up. Were I to simply shrug and appeal to sovereignty, it would, I suspect, come across as rather smugly superior. It is not helpful because partial truth rarely is.
It's kindof like saying "I don't really care about what you're concerned about" with a holy flair, isn't it?
"God is sovereign!" He sure is, and He uses ordinary means like us doing what is right by His Word to accomplish His sovereign plans.
"Why so gloomy?": because pulling up a chair and sharing burdens is WAAY to messy.
"His purposes are sure and certain." and what if His purpose is to bring disaster and judgment against wickedness? What then?
"What's one child against the ages of eternity?/Anything that happens...a blip, a road bump..." This would totally comfort a relative of a holocaust victim.
"Really, to fret is to disbelieve! Cheer up! You're making far too much of far too little!" Holy dressings on a sword rammed through the heart, and the sign of someone so shallow that they refuse to humble themselves and be sympathetic.
Really, in this whole exchange, the one who dresses his shallow words with holy truth does the exact opposite of what those truths are supposed to be used for: to comfort the grieving and fretting. They're all talk and no application. They see the facts but ignore them to get to the next sound byte, and yell "NEXT!". Both of these men would be better off keeping their mouths shut.
On Sunday, RC Sproul expressed his hope that America doesn't get what it deserves. I share that concern. We have continued to reelect congressmen who disregard the Constitution. We now have a president who disregards the Constitution in spades. Another four (or four hundred) years would be just. I hope God spares us but I fear the worst.
Okay, I'm a voter in the wasteland of California. So my presidential vote means zip-a-dee-do-dah. I have wrestled with the withholding-my-vote argument.
Abraham pleaded with God for mercy over the hope of having 10 righteous men in Sodom. Trusting his sovereignty, with my vote I'm pleading for mercy for those 10, that they may continue preaching in freedom.
I trust that my pastors will continue preaching, rejoicing in their persecution if the freedom to preach is taken from them. But by golly, I'm not going to wish persecution on them by voting for it.
So what you're saying is that this spirit of Pastor D Zaster is to politics what Hyper-Calvinism is to Christianity, in that it's like an emotionless and unloving response to events that should compel laments but instead are greeted with only apathy which is inexcusable regardless of the truthfulness of the theological knowledge behind it?
Or, as I read it, you aren't saying it's wrong to understand God's sovereignty and take comfort in it, but to ignore the reality and needs of our nation and the people of our nation is really unloving, right?
I wish I had some really wise thing to say, but I appreciated Stan's comments. There are so many I've talked to that will still vote Obama. My husband is from Mexico and only a legal resident, so he can't vote, but he would be voting for Romney if he could. The funny thing is, an Obama stumper called our house asking specifically for him and who he was going to vote for. He told them he couldn't vote but that if he could, he'd vote for Romney. They hung up on him.
How about this one? What if the Pastor said, "Count it all joy when you meet trials of various kinds."? Or, "I know how to be abased and to abound."? Or, "Be of good cheer for I have already overcome the world."? Same verdict? I have no beef with godly sorrow, which leads to repentance. I'm positively in favor of it. That comes from the Spirit of the Ages. Chicken Little, however, comes from the spirit of the age.
Right, Jeremiah (and, for that matter, RC): I am speaking in opposition of cliched, fatuous trivializing.
Mr. R.C., The three men you quoted didn't give detached, airy, uncompassionate responses to right grief and right anxiety. James and Paul and our Lord Jesus was suffering WITH those to whom they spoke. The men in this example detach themselves from suffering and, like Job's friends, just want to fix the person's problem and go on to the next.
A quote from Andrew Klavan at Pajamas Media:
"There are conservatives who confuse good principles with good outcomes and who mistake the feeling of wisdom for wisdom itself. I hear them say things like, “There’s no difference between Obama and Romney,” as if a president with no intention and no plan of fixing our looming debt crisis is the same as a candidate with a proven record of fixing such problems and who has given his word to try. They hold their firm adherence to their ideals above the doing of what good they can. They trumpet their vaunted love of liberty while throwing their vote away on a Gary Johnson or Ron Paul, which will do not one thing for their liberty or anyone else’s. At their worst, they cherish a sense of themselves as superior because of their fantasized solutions while discounting as a fool anyone who would support the best option available."
I am seeing the liberals on my fb feed post in a cool manner, not at all upset. Keep them all calm, everyone be civil. This is all really no big deal and "don't you trust in your God?" Well, I do trust in God. I trust in God when I have a fire in my kitchen, and I still smother it with baking soda myself. I don't want my house to burn down, and it doesn't take much wisdom to know I need to actually put out the fire quickly before it spreads through the house. In this election, there are issues of great importance. There is a fire, and we have a chance to put out the fire.
At their worst, they cherish a sense of themselves as superior because of their fantasized solutions while discounting as a fool anyone who would support the best option available.
Hear! Hear!
Christianlady, well-put!
"At their worst, they cherish a sense of themselves as superior because of their fantasized solutions while discounting as a fool anyone who would support the best option available."
Kevin, it seems Andrew has been hoisted on his own petard. This quote could apply just as well to Governor Romney voters as to those who won't vote for Governor Romney. We're all big fat jerks.
Yeah, anyone who's been under a rock for the last year and wants to ask what the big deal about this election, shame on you. I'm not going to allow you to try to get others to do your homework for you. Next time wake up and pay adult attention.
I do mot want Romney as president. Neither party nor their pundits speak truthfully. No one had any interest in deficit reduction until it became a weapon that could be used.
And I am deeply afraid that the same is true of abortion. I am afraid it is being used to stir up the electorate to get power to move forward on a different agenda. But I cannot vote for someone who admits that their personal beliefs are so weak that they will allow murder. I will hold my nose, vote, and trust God.
Dan, when I read your post, I immediately thought of Jesus lamenting over Jerusalem. If anyone understood sovereignty, it was Him. No greater issue could possibly exist next to the visitation of the long promised Messiah. There was no glib comment by Jesus regarding their blindness and hard hearts.
Whoever wins this election likely appoints at least one new, lifetime justice to SCOTUS. That is the place where our (legal) national standards will be set. If we legalize more depravity, we will get more depravity as the old depravity just isn't depraved enough to be fun and exciting anymore.
Anyone else who wants to feign blinking-eyed unawareness of the importance of this election: ask mommy or daddy. I'm serious. Lots of blogs allow the inanest comments. Pick one and go there. This isn't one of them.
Matt Aznoe: still ignorant, still wrong, still unteachable.
Stay off my metas, Matt.
All right: Dan has been a good sport this week, but a pretty serious gadfly to those over the last year who say things glibly but confidently as if their views of wisdom make them good teachers and good stewards. I myself have tried to be serious and sober about this question because I am neither a fan of Obama nor a fan of mid-center Republicanism not a fan of neo-anarchic Libertarianism. Many of the people I call personal friends own their own businesses, and we all share a common sense of needing the Government just a little more than we can do without it. And most of my friends are the kinds of Christians who don't let a stranger in trouble stay in trouble if it can be helped.
Preamble concluded.
That's why I am really on the brink of going postal over all the cognates the the unsubstantiated Spurgeon quote, "Of two evils, choose neither." If someone can point me to where Spurgeon did say this, I'd be grateful. But the sentiment there is so utterly daft, so utterly apart from adult (and Biblical) moral reasoning, that I have to lay into it one last time (at least this week) so that the idiots who are espousing it will at least sting until bedtime over it.
The first problem is the definition of "evil" here -- which they imagine to be simply a point taken. In their view of it, it's just axiomatic that Mitt Romney == Barack Obama. What complete hogwash. That's like saying Dan Phillips == Peter Lumpkins because they are both bloggers. Anyone with eyes has to admit that Mitt Romney made his fortune in the private sector and not by being famous; Barack Obama made his fortune after he became a politician, and by virtue of his fame. Mitt Romney absolutely has vetoed all measures violating the right to life which have come before him; Barack Obama has even voted in support of partial birth abortion. Mitt Romney has a history of balancing budgets, publicly and privately; Barack Obama has a history of escaping the responsibility of budgeting at all. If all other parts of these men's record are identical, these distinctions matter. Equating them is an outright lie, and it is a shameful thing.
So when someone comes out and says they are "choosing between two evils" in these two men, what must they be saying if they are not going to be an obvious and unmitigated liar? What they are saying is that neither men is sufficiently different from the status quo to make a change we can live with. To that argument, I can have some sympathy -- but suddenly this moral high ground and the high horse of God's Holiness in his own people is no longer at stake. See: if the problem is that Obama will never balance the budget (much less mitigate the debt) but Romney will only slightly improve the deficit (and only slightly improve the debt) but White Knight Candidate has promised to slash-and-burn the federal budget to $1 trillion and end all abortions (putting both the women and the doctors responsible in prison, and maybe to death, since we are talking about murder), so I can't vote for Romney or Obama because White Knight has promised me both a New Heaven and a New Earth, you have to ask yourself: what is my vote for, really?
[more]
[con't]
See: is my vote meant for the assuaging of my sense of moral imagination and for my sense of what a good boy am I, or is it for the sake of pragmatically accomplishing the art of governing in a republic? Because if it is the former, by all means: vote for White Knight. Vote for Moses or Elijah. Vote, in fact, for Jesus Christ as Mark Driscoll fatuously recently advised. I mean: don't just vote for "better promises" in the human sense -- vote for the one whom the Bible says will get all of it done, in the name of the LORD.
But here's the thing: your vote is not actually a salve for your conscience, or a kind of dipstick of you sanctification by measuring your good intentions. It is not the finally-righteous way to say, "be warm, be well fed." Your vote is a conscious political act -- just like obeying traffic signals or trading with legal tender. It isn't a way to win an argument on the internet, either. It's what you actually do as part of the government of this country. It's a "do" not a "might".
This is why, for example, Ron Paul is such an intransigent talker of trash: he has been in the Federal Government for 15 years and has not sponsored ONE piece of legislation which could get passed by the House -- except one bill to make one property in Houston a national Historic site. When he steps up to the national stage and then says, "well, I promise to slash the budget, slash the size of government, and save all the babies," you are either credulous enough to say, "duh, yup - sounds good," or you have to do what any adult would do and ask the question, "By what means, Mr. On-The_payroll-For-15-Years-With-Nothing-To-Show-For-It."
He has never done what he says ought to be done, and can't find a way to get others to do it. He's actually an example of politicians who promise the moon and the sun and fail to deliver anything at all -- except his own paycheck (even if he has studiously refused the Congressional pension). Yet this is the man these "choose no evil" people are very keen on: men with no idea how to move the ball forward, but are convinced they can outscore the entire hall of fame.
So I'll not regale you again with examples of the fire department our your own doctor or dentist about the lesser of two evils. You people with the very sensitive consciences are so set of God's holiness that on the sabbath, you'd not even help a neighbor pull his oxen from the ditch. You choose to sit in your holy sauna and succeed in your head as if political responsibility in the real world worked like World of Warcraft. It's no such thing, and you bare the responsibility for your absurd and infantile manner of moral reasoning.
I'm done. have a nice day.
Thx to DJP for catching the critical typo in the last comment.
Frank,
I cannot find anything on the internet about Paul Ryan turning down his Congressional pension.
Or do you just mean he advocates doing away with Social Security (as we know it now)?
Reread, Peter. It was a typo, since corrected.
I cannot recall ever disagreeing with Dan or Frank on anyhthing posted on Pyro. The fact that I disagree today, vehemently even, makes me think I am missing something. I just do not know what it is....I cannot reconcile this at all. I just don' t understand the importance put on the election or politics at all. I understand that it matters to a certain degree, just do not see why some think it to be very important.
I am not a Foxbot or any other negative name that gets attached to people, I understand fully the issues and do not need to ask another adult to explain them to me. All I am saying is I just don't get it. Nothing changes tomorrow. Abortion will still be legal, and so will every other awful policy The system is broke and cannot be fixed. Nothing today can or will change it.
I am completely open to ridicule here to set me straight....what am I mising?
Sorry for the 2 typos....still learning to use iPad properly. I really do know how to spell :)
Tyler, if you never disagreed with Dan or Frank on these issues until today, when did you start reading Pyro? Yesterday?
Frank, when you described the record of Ron Paul I thought about Napoleon Dynamite's uncle Rico and this line: " How much you wanna make a bet I can throw a football over them mountains?... Yeah... Coach woulda put me in fourth quarter, we would've been state champions. No doubt. No doubt in my mind. "
Been reading for years, I generally ignore the posts that have been on politics....today's just happened to strike me that I should consider what was written. I believe in the same priciples/ doctrines that Pyro does, I am just stumped at the correlation today. I love DP's analogies, but todays just did not compute
Tyler, Read Frank's lengthy comments above.
Stan - just read them. It appears my disconnect is the "responsibilty" part of participating in the political "process".
Was there a previous post that addressed this for me to check out? To be clear, I am not trolling.....I genuinely appreciate Pyro and the guys and just trying to understand.
Tyler, If it is in your power to do good to others you should do it. Abortion policy, Obamacare, supreme court nominations, and foreign policy are just a few of the ways the president impacts the lives of others. Your vote, provided you vote in a Biblically responsible manner, is a way to influence the world, particularly the U.S., for good. Do it!
Some of the same people who (thankfully!) forcefully oppose hypercalvinism, antinomianism, and other forms of "oh well, it doesn't really matter what I do" fatalism will be the ones promoting an "oh well, it doesn't really matter" fatalism regarding to politics.
On one issue, they say it doesn't matter because God is sovereign. On the others, they correctly say that it matters because God is sovereign.
God's sovereignty is (among other things) a comfort in the midst of genuine grief and a call to boldness and action. I can't think of it ever being a call to throw up your hands and not care.
Or, Trogdor, to scold those who are trying their best to do all they can do.
Tyler:
Because you are a faithful reader, and not prone to being a troll, here's my answer:
[1] God ordains governments, even (and perhaps especially) democracies.
[2] In a democracy, it's a false perception that power lies at the top of the pyramid. Because all power in the system is intentionally time-limited, it is derived (in the human sense of the word) from those who have elected the officials. That means that the most important people in a democracy are the voters, not the politicians. We are the only ones who have any chance of allowing any more years of anything.
[2a] BTW, this is the reason you ought to belong to a political party and not merely walk around "independent" and talk like you're really smart. In a democracy, coalitions get action and individuals with flappy lips get disappointed (at least).
[3] The clever person can here insert Rom 13 and come up with at least 3 good reason why it turns out that when Paul is talking about the magistrate there (to Roman citizens) we Christians in a Western Democracy can find ourselves with fingers point at ourselves for what ought to be done by the government -- and voting in that way. The have seen the minister of the sword, and he is us.
That's a 3.5 point starter. Does that help?
Keith G -- off-topic. See this and this.
And I think you should vote, today, still, for Romney.
Frank - Thanks for taking the time to do this and being gracious.
1) agree 100%
2) agree that is the intent of democracy, but not true now in ours. Can that be proven either way?
2a) Is it your contention that a believer must be part of a poltical party? Am I biblically bound to participate? Am I sinning in staying out of it? If yes to any/all of those, is it clear or a conscience issue?
3) Understood. Do you believe that the current political system allows for this to happen?
Thanks again.
Dan, you're right, that was pretty off-topic. Comment removed with apologies.
More on-topic comment: I have never heard of someone like Pastor D. Zaster, and I can only hope that people like that don't exist. However, I've also never heard of people like Famous Religionist. That might be because I don't read many blogs besides Pyro and Doug Wilson, but even in my personal conversations with like-minded Christian, I have yet to find such naivety.
However, I have several personal friends who seem convinced that if President Obama wins the election, America dies, and with it, the world. Having discussed things like this with them in the past, I know that they tie very closely American triumph/prosperity with Christian triumph/prosperity. This seems to me to go beyond "An anxious American expresses his fears and concerns about today's presidential election" and into serious error.
Now, I am not for expressing the sovereignty of God in such a mindless, naive way as Famous Religionist; but is there no place for expressing hope in God's sovereignty and the triumph of Christianity, even on the eve of such a crucial election? Can we not all agree that, even if President Obama is re-elected, the damage he can do will not go beyond the limit that God has set, and that te Christian Church WILL still triumph?
Frank; your monster double comment above was really encouraging and edifying. One thing you mentioned that I had not thought of was the Proverbs 3:27 connection.
Thanks for taking the time.
For the record: this morning I did post Daniel 2:21 and James 1:17 both as a facebook status and on a friend's status which mentioned being nervous about the election. I truly hope I was not being flippant. It's just that that is the message I preach to myself--and it is comforting. It is just as comforting today as it was 14 years ago when the sheriff came to my door to tell me my husband had just been killed in a hit-and-run accident.
I think where Pastor D. Zaster goes wrong is when he trivializes the pain by saying "it's just a blip/bump", and "what's one child...?"
I will probably quote this incorrectly, as I've long since lost the j-card on which it was written, but Michael Card had a statement written inside his 'Poeima' cassette that went something like this: "Never enter the sacred place of someone else's pain without the name of Jesus on your lips".
The important part is that a person's pain is a sacred place. It's a place where we can meet God, that pain. No one should ever enter it irreverently, as did Pastor D. Zaster.
And I know...this post is about politics, not pastoring. The point is still valid, and I need to hear it worse than anyone else here, not being gifted with an overabundance of compassion.
I mourn mainly for the level of Biblical illiteracy among people who claim to be Christians and can not only vote for Obama, but say he is a Christian. People need to just come out and say they want what they want and don't read the Bible, but feel like there is a God somewhere and just go to church to try to appease Him. They need to quit trying to call themselves followers/slaves of Christ and justify their actions because Jesus NEVER did that.
Also, I'm guessing that we're not going to hear all of those people from the Gore campaign come and cry about Romney winning the popular vote if that holds up.
Oh, by the way...God is sovereign and Jesus offered a lament for Jerusalem and its leaders in Matthew 23:37. The prophets also lamented the state of affairs in Israel. So should we also be upset by the state of our country and the world around us.
*stands up*
*slow claps*
*coughs loudly in Russell Moore's direction*
Also, there was an embarrassment of riches in the "stupid post-election comments" pool, but I'll pull just one out of the hat at random and pulverize it. For a dark laugh:
"Friends, if your god can be stopped by Barack Obama, then we ought to be talking about your faith, not your politics."
Okay, number one, who said God was going to be "stopped" by Barack Obama? SATAN can't "stop" God, so do we act like it's silly to be concerned about the things he does? No? Neither do we act that way for Obama, or any evil earthly agent of Satan's. Number two, something tells me the person making that comment doesn't really think Obama is evil anyway, in which case maybe it's not my faith or my politics that needs examining but his brain.
Would you tell us which, "Let's give him a conference so he can tell us more" self-appointed "pastor(s)" you're referring to, DJP?
Truly, I didn't even have one specific name in mind.
It must be noted that what Pastor D. Zastor and Famous Religionist say are true, never mind their manner of delivery. I've only scanned the comments, but I'm surprised no one has attempted to point out Dan's apparent callousness regarding inane comments as breaking the principle advocated here. Truth does no good unless it's meted out helpfully. But a blog like this has a wide audience and you can't cater to everyone's needs in the same presentation of the truth.
For what it's worth, the truth as Pastor D. Zaster has presented it has been very encouraging to me personally in similar situations although I realize that most people need a different approach. So the approach is rather subjective. Such subjective approaches to the objective truth are acknowledged as perfectly valid, and indeed warranted, in the Bible as Dan has rightly pointed out.
Huh? What is it that you see that everyone else has missed, again?
Post a Comment