by Frank Turk
Meanwhile, in the offices of the Evangelical Movement ...
Meanwhile, in the offices of the Evangelical Movement ...
13 June 2012
11 June 2012
Phil Johnson Unplugged
by Phil Johnson
oday was my 59th birthday. In other words, I'm now officially in my 60th year. Last week I did some careful reflecting; I also did some calculating; and it was—how shall I say this?—unsettling. Convicting. Alarming. In the very best case, I figure I might have a decade and a half of productive full-time labor left. Looking back on the past 15 years, I realize that's a very brief time. I want to make the most of it.
Thursday my doctor confirmed what I was beginning to think: I need to cut out everything non-essential in my life that causes stress without giving me any cardiovascular benefit. I hate when geriatric patients recite the details of their medical reports, so let's just say that the doctor was serious: It's time for me to stop burning the candle at both ends. Darlene emphatically affirmed that diagnosis. Everyone who loves me is likewise in hearty agreement.
So: (gladly, with no reluctance whatsoever) I'm officially retiring from blogging, social media, and every other activity that intrudes on things that ought to be the real priorities in the final two decades of a man's life.
I started blogging 7 years ago because I was concerned about the drift of postmodern evangelicalism and the Emerging Church Movement. I've said everything I have to say about that issue—and many more issues. In fact, as I think about it, I have probably at one point or another blogged about almost everything I'm really passionate about. I don't have any significant opinions left.
Thanks for reading and responding to my posts over the years. I'm handing over the PyroManiacs' master keys to Frank and Dan (who are both better bloggers than I am anyway). They can do with the blog whatever they like: conscript Chantry to be the third man, have a contest to recruit other new team members, or simply close up shop. (But if you guys opt for the latter, please leave the archives online as a kind of Ebenezer.)
Most people don't realize this, but Frank, Dan, and I did not know one another when we started blogging. By the time we formed a group blog in January of '06, I had met Frank only once and Dan never. But I had been reading what they wrote at their own blogs, and felt certain we would work well together as a team. That turned out to be a good call—but all credit for keeping the machinery of our teamwork well-oiled goes to them, not me. Best of all, we've become good friends, and that friendship (including fellowship with our families) will continue. I promise.
But my blogging stops here. I've already got more than enough deadlines to keep me busy for the rest of my life, without the additional stress of writing 2-3 weekly posts and trying to keep up with every controversy in the blogosphere. As interesting as that is, it's not my most important duty—by a long shot. And at my age, nothing would be more tragic than letting my priorities get confused.
"The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all" (2 Thessalonians 3:18).
oday was my 59th birthday. In other words, I'm now officially in my 60th year. Last week I did some careful reflecting; I also did some calculating; and it was—how shall I say this?—unsettling. Convicting. Alarming. In the very best case, I figure I might have a decade and a half of productive full-time labor left. Looking back on the past 15 years, I realize that's a very brief time. I want to make the most of it.Thursday my doctor confirmed what I was beginning to think: I need to cut out everything non-essential in my life that causes stress without giving me any cardiovascular benefit. I hate when geriatric patients recite the details of their medical reports, so let's just say that the doctor was serious: It's time for me to stop burning the candle at both ends. Darlene emphatically affirmed that diagnosis. Everyone who loves me is likewise in hearty agreement.
So: (gladly, with no reluctance whatsoever) I'm officially retiring from blogging, social media, and every other activity that intrudes on things that ought to be the real priorities in the final two decades of a man's life.
I started blogging 7 years ago because I was concerned about the drift of postmodern evangelicalism and the Emerging Church Movement. I've said everything I have to say about that issue—and many more issues. In fact, as I think about it, I have probably at one point or another blogged about almost everything I'm really passionate about. I don't have any significant opinions left.
Thanks for reading and responding to my posts over the years. I'm handing over the PyroManiacs' master keys to Frank and Dan (who are both better bloggers than I am anyway). They can do with the blog whatever they like: conscript Chantry to be the third man, have a contest to recruit other new team members, or simply close up shop. (But if you guys opt for the latter, please leave the archives online as a kind of Ebenezer.)
Most people don't realize this, but Frank, Dan, and I did not know one another when we started blogging. By the time we formed a group blog in January of '06, I had met Frank only once and Dan never. But I had been reading what they wrote at their own blogs, and felt certain we would work well together as a team. That turned out to be a good call—but all credit for keeping the machinery of our teamwork well-oiled goes to them, not me. Best of all, we've become good friends, and that friendship (including fellowship with our families) will continue. I promise.
But my blogging stops here. I've already got more than enough deadlines to keep me busy for the rest of my life, without the additional stress of writing 2-3 weekly posts and trying to keep up with every controversy in the blogosphere. As interesting as that is, it's not my most important duty—by a long shot. And at my age, nothing would be more tragic than letting my priorities get confused.
"The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all" (2 Thessalonians 3:18).
UPDATED: Frank here. I don't want to spoil Phil's final post, but there is some mass hysteria churning up in the comments, so for the sake of clarity, before you comment, note:
1. All of Phil's posts here and at the original Pyromaniac blog will remain here and there until Google crashes or Jesus returns.
2. To my knowledge, the spurgeon.org server will remain up and running with the Spurgeon Archives utterly in tact.
3. Phi's announcement is that he is leaving these things as finished works, not as trash at the curbside, so let's maintain our perspective.
Right now Dan and I have no plans to "replace" Phil, as if that was even possible. However, we also have no plans of shuttering this blog. What gets said here still needs to be said, and nobody else is going to say it. To paraphrase a great line, these posts aren't going to write themselves.
Back to the wailing and gnashing of teeth.
1. All of Phil's posts here and at the original Pyromaniac blog will remain here and there until Google crashes or Jesus returns.
2. To my knowledge, the spurgeon.org server will remain up and running with the Spurgeon Archives utterly in tact.
3. Phi's announcement is that he is leaving these things as finished works, not as trash at the curbside, so let's maintain our perspective.
Right now Dan and I have no plans to "replace" Phil, as if that was even possible. However, we also have no plans of shuttering this blog. What gets said here still needs to be said, and nobody else is going to say it. To paraphrase a great line, these posts aren't going to write themselves.
Back to the wailing and gnashing of teeth.
10 June 2012
All the Responsibilities
posted by Frank Turk
The PyroManiacs devote some space each weekend to highlights from The Spurgeon Archive.The following excerpt is from sermon #762 on the text of Jeremiah 3:14, delivered at the Metropolitan Tabernacle.
Through all the depths of sin and woe;
And on the cross will even dare
The bitter pains of death to bear."
He never shrunk from the doing of any of those loving works which belong to the husband of his chosen spouse. He exalted the word "husband," and made it to be more full of meaning than it had ever been before, so that the apostle could see it glittering in a new light, and could say, "Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it." Oh, yes! dear friends, there is a responsibility arising out of this relationship, but he of whom we speak has not departed from it; you know he has not. And now, what upon our side? The wife has to reverence her husband, and to be subject unto him in all things. That is precisely our position towards him who has married us. Let his will be our will. Let his wish be our law. Let us not need to be flogged to service, but let us say—
In swift obedience move."
O Christian, if the Master condescends to say, "I am married unto you," you will not any longer ask, "What is my duty?" but you will say, "What can I do for him?" The loving wife does not say, "What is my duty?" and stand coldly questioning how far she should go, and how little she may do, but all that she can do for him who is her husband she will do, and everything that she can think of, every thing she can devote herself to, in striving to please him in all things she will most certainly do and perform. And you and I will do the same if we have realized our union with Christ. O beloved, do not grow sentimental and waste your energies in driveling fancies as some have done. Speak ye of a wife?—where the family is large, the work is heavy, and the responsibility great. I could fain remind you here, did time permit, of the words of King Lemuel, and the prophecy that his mother taught him. Bear with me at least while I admonish you to such a one, that the heart of thy husband may safely trust in thee. Let it be thy care to give meat to thy household. Lay thy hands to the spindle; suffer not thine industry to fail; eat not the bread of idleness. Stretch out thine hand to the poor, and reach forth both thine hands to the needy. Open thy mouth with wisdom, and in thy tongue be the law of kindness. Yea, and consider this with thyself, that in thy regard for all the duties of thy station, thou art fulfilling thy bounden obligations to thy Lord. Short words, but mighty, matchless deeds have told how Jesus loved us. Be it ours to carve our song of love to him on the hearts of some tender nurslings who are cast in our way, and committed to our care. O that the life I now live in the flesh, by faith in the Son of God, might become a poem, and a grateful response to him that loved me, and gave himself for me. I hope we do know, then, that when God says, "I am married unto you," it necessitates mutual relations.
08 June 2012
Briefly: Baptists
by Frank Turk
Dan is doing pastorly things today, and Phil always has his hands full, so that leaves either me or Pecadillo to fill the bandwidth today. Since he fights crime for a living, I guess it has to be me.
On the heels of the dust-up over at the Southern Baptist Convention, someone recently quipped that being a baptist (small "b" intended) is about ecclesiology and not about soteriology, which at its core is true enough. However, I think a lot of our non-baptist friends would be quick to point out that this is prolly a pretty narrow view of what happens when you adopt a credobaptist view of baptism vs. a paedobaptist view of baptism. For example, you don't find a lot of Presbyterian street preachers or Lutheran missionaries.
But that said, I think the very-narrow distinction proffered there misses the point of the complaint leveled by the "traditional" complainers. The fellows who want the 50-year-old populist theology replete with the ol' convention songs are not concerned with being small-"b" baptists: they are concerned about being, as they see it, Southern Baptists®. If we recognize that, the rest of their complaints and angry eyebrows make a lot more sense. They don't want to accidentally be Presbyterians or Lutherans or Methodists (which is ironic, given the kind of theology they are sending up the flag pole).
At the end of the day, they are standing up for a kind of Christian culture. There's something vaguely-admirable about that when we are in the decline of Western Civilization, even if it also vaguely resembles the kind of religion that had a closed magisterium and built giant cathedrals to really pack 'em in.
On the heels of the dust-up over at the Southern Baptist Convention, someone recently quipped that being a baptist (small "b" intended) is about ecclesiology and not about soteriology, which at its core is true enough. However, I think a lot of our non-baptist friends would be quick to point out that this is prolly a pretty narrow view of what happens when you adopt a credobaptist view of baptism vs. a paedobaptist view of baptism. For example, you don't find a lot of Presbyterian street preachers or Lutheran missionaries.
But that said, I think the very-narrow distinction proffered there misses the point of the complaint leveled by the "traditional" complainers. The fellows who want the 50-year-old populist theology replete with the ol' convention songs are not concerned with being small-"b" baptists: they are concerned about being, as they see it, Southern Baptists®. If we recognize that, the rest of their complaints and angry eyebrows make a lot more sense. They don't want to accidentally be Presbyterians or Lutherans or Methodists (which is ironic, given the kind of theology they are sending up the flag pole).
At the end of the day, they are standing up for a kind of Christian culture. There's something vaguely-admirable about that when we are in the decline of Western Civilization, even if it also vaguely resembles the kind of religion that had a closed magisterium and built giant cathedrals to really pack 'em in.
07 June 2012
No. Why do you ask?
by Frank Turk
We're buried. No post today. But I am sure you people have comments you want to leave ...
We're buried. No post today. But I am sure you people have comments you want to leave ...
06 June 2012
The Case for Gay Marriage (2 of 3)
by Frank Turk
So last week I asked for a secular definition of marriage which actually helped us understand what the advocates of Gay Marriage are looking for. It was an honest question because I had in my back pocket this essay by Richard Waghorn, which is a weird twin cousin of this essay by the ineffable Sam Schulman.
But we did happen to come up with, I think, the best possible secular definition of marriage via twitter. It's found at TheFreeDictionary.com, and it goes like this:
Marriage is usually heterosexual and entails exclusive rights and duties of sexual performance, but there are instructive exceptions. For example, Nayar women of India would ritually marry men of a superior caste, have numerous lovers, and bear legitimate children. Among the Dahomey of West Africa, one woman could marry another; the first woman would be the legal "father" of the children (by other men) of the second. These examples highlight the functions of marriage to reproduce both a domestic division of labor and social relationships between different groups. Such functions are served even by the more common type of marriage, the union of one or more men with one or more women.
In most societies men and women are valued for their different roles in the household economy. Marriage therefore often occasions other economic exchanges. If a woman's labor is highly valued, a man may be required to offer valuable goods (bride-price) or his own labor (bride-service) to his wife's family. If a man's labor is more highly valued, the bride's family may offer goods (dowry) to the husband or his family.
Although marriage tends to be regarded in many places as a permanent tie, divorce is allowed in most modern societies. The causes of divorce vary, but adultery, desertion, infertility, failure to provide the necessities of life, mistreatment, and incompatibility are the most common. Civil unions are now permitted in Western countries, but for nearly a thousand years marriage in the Western world was a religious contract. The Christian church undertook its supervision in the 9th cent., when newlywed couples instituted the practice of coming to the church door to have their union blessed by the priest. Eventually the church regulated marriage through canon law. In contemporary N Europe marriage has lost some of importance, especially as social legislation has emphasized assuring equal financial benefits and legal standing to children born to unwed parents.
And here's my point in bringing that up: I want you to ponder this definition deeply, and think about it as if it was the only definition of marriage you had ever known. Think about it as if this was the definition behind the law of the land, and as if it was the reason people actually got married in the first place.
Now fire up your imagination for a second. Imagine you are at dinner with some other person, and you've been thinking about this for a long time. As the waiter leaves with your order of eats for the evening, you clench up a little, and then screw your courage to the sticking place. You take a deep breath and you begin, "What I really want is to avoid incest, and embrace endogamy. I want some rights and duties regarding sexual intercourse and property, and to establish a nominal division of labor. I want a visible household economy. And you seem like exactly the right person to do that with, at least for now. Will you marry me?"
Is there anyone who would really say that, or really want that?
Consider that, and I'll register part 3 next week to tie this all together.
So last week I asked for a secular definition of marriage which actually helped us understand what the advocates of Gay Marriage are looking for. It was an honest question because I had in my back pocket this essay by Richard Waghorn, which is a weird twin cousin of this essay by the ineffable Sam Schulman.
But we did happen to come up with, I think, the best possible secular definition of marriage via twitter. It's found at TheFreeDictionary.com, and it goes like this:
Marriage
socially sanctioned union that reproduces the family. In all societies the choice of partners is generally guided by rules of exogamy (the obligation to marry outside a group); some societies also have rules of endogamy (the obligation to marry within a group). These rules may be prescriptive or, as in the case of the incest taboo, proscriptive; they generally apply to kinship groups such as clan or lineage; residential groups; and social groups such as the ethnic group, caste, or class.Marriage is usually heterosexual and entails exclusive rights and duties of sexual performance, but there are instructive exceptions. For example, Nayar women of India would ritually marry men of a superior caste, have numerous lovers, and bear legitimate children. Among the Dahomey of West Africa, one woman could marry another; the first woman would be the legal "father" of the children (by other men) of the second. These examples highlight the functions of marriage to reproduce both a domestic division of labor and social relationships between different groups. Such functions are served even by the more common type of marriage, the union of one or more men with one or more women.
In most societies men and women are valued for their different roles in the household economy. Marriage therefore often occasions other economic exchanges. If a woman's labor is highly valued, a man may be required to offer valuable goods (bride-price) or his own labor (bride-service) to his wife's family. If a man's labor is more highly valued, the bride's family may offer goods (dowry) to the husband or his family.
Marriage as a Societal Bond
In many societies marriage links not just nuclear families but larger social formations as well. Some endogamous societies are divided into different exogamous groups (such as clans or lineages): Men form alliances through the exchange of women, and the social organization regulates these alliances through marriage rules. In some cases, two men from different groups exchange sisters for brides. Other instances involve an adult man marrying the young or infant daughter of another man; sexual relations would be deferred for many years, but the two men will have formed a strong bond. Marriages are often arranged by the families through the services of a matchmaker or go-between, and commence with a ritual celebration, or wedding. Some cultures practice trial marriage; the couple lives together before deciding whether they should marry. Society generally prescribes where newlywed couples should live: In patrilocal cultures, they live with or near the husband's family; in matrilocal ones, with or near the wife's family. Under neolocal residence, the couple establishes their own household.Although marriage tends to be regarded in many places as a permanent tie, divorce is allowed in most modern societies. The causes of divorce vary, but adultery, desertion, infertility, failure to provide the necessities of life, mistreatment, and incompatibility are the most common. Civil unions are now permitted in Western countries, but for nearly a thousand years marriage in the Western world was a religious contract. The Christian church undertook its supervision in the 9th cent., when newlywed couples instituted the practice of coming to the church door to have their union blessed by the priest. Eventually the church regulated marriage through canon law. In contemporary N Europe marriage has lost some of importance, especially as social legislation has emphasized assuring equal financial benefits and legal standing to children born to unwed parents.
Forms of Marriage
Monogamy (the union of one wife to one husband) is the prevalent form almost everywhere. Polygyny (or polygamy; having several wives at one time), however, has been a prerogative in many societies (see harem). It is commonly found where the value of women's labor is high and may be practiced as a way of acquiring allies: A man may cement his bonds with several other men by marrying their sisters or daughters. Polyandry (having several husbands at one time) is rare, having occurred infrequently in Tibetan society, among the Marquesas of Polynesia, and among certain hill tribes in India. People who enjoy only a marginal subsistence may practice polyandry as a way of limiting births. It is also practiced where brothers must work together to sustain one household; they share one wife. The custom of marrying a widow to her late husband's brother is known as levirate marriage and was common among the ancient Hebrews. In sororate marriages a widower marries his deceased (or barren) wife's sister. The levirate and the sororate occur in societies where marriage is seen to create an alliance between groups; the deceased spouse's group has a duty to provide a new spouse to the widow or widower, thereby preserving the alliance. In recent years many gay-rights groups have sought official recognition of same-sex couples that would be comparable to marriage.
Now fire up your imagination for a second. Imagine you are at dinner with some other person, and you've been thinking about this for a long time. As the waiter leaves with your order of eats for the evening, you clench up a little, and then screw your courage to the sticking place. You take a deep breath and you begin, "What I really want is to avoid incest, and embrace endogamy. I want some rights and duties regarding sexual intercourse and property, and to establish a nominal division of labor. I want a visible household economy. And you seem like exactly the right person to do that with, at least for now. Will you marry me?"
Is there anyone who would really say that, or really want that?
Consider that, and I'll register part 3 next week to tie this all together.
05 June 2012
Marriage: the one in the twoness
by Dan Phillips
Last time we busted a couple of marriage myths, one of which was the notion that it takes two to create marital ill health. We should dismember, bury, and forget the distracting lie of the Democratic Causality Myth, and we should take "blunt force trauma" (verbal or otherwise) out of our toolbox and toss it into the Atlantic, to sink down into the darkness forever after Rose's big dumb diamond.
So there are still problems in the marriage. What do we do?
I'll address pastors, but write with the assumption that all other interested parties are reading along. It won't be difficult to adjust and apply.
So here's the dilemma most pastors face most frequently. The person who's talking to you is unlikely to be the cause of the problems. I mean, look — show of hands, brothers: how many of you pastors have had a lady walk into your office and say, "You know, my husband's actually a pretty decent guy — loving, faithful, godly, devoted to me and the kids, hard-working... but I just can't seem to help verbally tearing him down to bloody shreds just about every chance I get. You got something for that?" Or how many men make an appointment to say, "My wife is an amazing lady. She's godly, incredibly competent and wise, treats me with love and respect, terrific mother... but I just like to spend every spare moment sitting around playing video games as if I was a no-account ten-year-old. Got some advice for me?"
No, in those situations, it would likelier be the husband or the wife (respectively) who's in the office, lamenting about the other's behavior. The other person doesn't have a problem — or so she thinks, so he thinks. But they aren't there. So, what's to say to the person who is actually in front of us?
Though conscious that my readership bristles with far wiser and better pastors than I, probably we all agree that the person we need to help is the person who's there. We won't really get anywhere talking at great length about the person who isn't. Right? Of course, if anyone has ideas about how to revolutionize the life of Party B by having a heart-to-heart with Party A, I'd love to hear it. I'll write a book. But meanwhile, on Planet Earth...
Not only can't we "fix" the absent party, we can't even really assess him. Remember Prov. 18:17? The soul before us could be a genuine suffering martyr, or (s)he could be a Suffering Martyr©, if you know what I mean. So whatever (s)he says about the other, we simply are not in a position to adjudicate, most of the time. Therefore, if we approach the time as "Sixty minutes to assign blame," it's likelier to be "Sixty minutes down the drain," isn't it?
What to do? Just this:
Deal with the person in front of you. You have plenty to say to that person. For instance, check this and this and this, just for starters. If you'd just read those thoughtfully, we might be done here. But let me assume that you have, and add just a couple of specifics.
Let's say you're talking to a wife in a troubled marriage. I don't know that there's really any great payoff (for her, for God's glory) in spending much time debating the truth of her complaints. Is there? Wouldn't it work to say something like, "I'm sure you understand, only you and God and your husband was there when that happened. I don't have any personal knowledge. But let's say that everything is exactly 100% as you say it is..."
Then where do you go? First, isn't it the case that most of the things that enrage the wives who come in for help are complaints, and not sins? I'm not saying that complaints don't matter, I'm just saying let's categorize them. She's enraged or frustrated or depressed or distraught because of his communication, his use of his time, his habits — not his frequent acts of murder, his constant adultery, his serial thefts. Right?
Wouldn't it be wisdom then to ask her, "Is this a sin? Do you have a Bible verse telling me this is a sin?" And then, whatever the answer, wouldn't it be wisdom to ask, "Do you know what God tells you to do even when your husband is actually sinning — not just failing to live up to your expectations and preferences, but sinning?"
Then go to 1 Peter 3:1-6. Expound. Discuss. Apply. (I'll have more to say in just a tick.)
Perhaps it isn't the wife. Maybe you're talking to a husband in a troubled marriage. What do you do?
Much the same, only go to 1 Peter 3:6, and then perhaps to Ephesians 5:25ff., and Colossians 3:19. Expound. Discuss. Apply.
And here's the point, bringing together those passages plus the articles linked above: be sure to point out that none of those passages is conditioned on the other person's behavior.* That is, the apostle never says, "Wives, respect and subordinate yourselves to your husband only when you agree with what he's doing." Nor does he ever say, "Husbands, you must love your wives as Christ loves the church when and only when you find her lovable, submissive and pleasant."
On the contrary, do not all the passages rather assume imperfection in the object loved? Peter does so explicitly; what of Christ in the church? Just think, for a moment, if Christ loved the church only when the church deserved His love — but at all other times He felt free to withdraw in sullen poutiness, or respond in kind? Think, I say, then shudder in horror, and be wiser.
As long as we are married to each other,** we are obligated — personally, individually, each of us — to do all that God says we are to do. He does not condition it on the other's behavior.
That truth is both heavily obligating and freeing. You don't need me to expound how I am obligated by it. But it frees me from trying to decide how to behave, whether to be loving-Christlike-husband guy or fridge-fisted-boxer-guy (verbally or physically). Simple: I'm never called to be fridge-fisted-boxer-guy. I'm always called to be loving-Christlike-husband guy, irrespective of how my wife treats me.
Then you begin to realize that all those verses you thought were out-there are suddenly right-in-here, verses like Matthew 5:9-12, 21-26, 38-48; 7:12; Rom. 13:10-21, and all the rest. They aren't for then. They're for right now, right here, in your marriage.
I know. It's not worldly wisdom. The flesh hates just about every word I've written.
But insofar as it is Biblical, it is wisdom.
*Well, you almost could argue that 1 Peter 3:1ff. is an exception, couldn't you — but in the other direction? In other words, Peter doesn't say, "If your husband does this good thing, you must then do that good thing." Rather, he says, "If your husband does this bad thing, you must then do that good thing."
**In this way, once again, I am removing divorce from this entire discussion. We aren't talking about whether and how and when to end a marriage. We're talking about how to think behave within a marriage.
Last time we busted a couple of marriage myths, one of which was the notion that it takes two to create marital ill health. We should dismember, bury, and forget the distracting lie of the Democratic Causality Myth, and we should take "blunt force trauma" (verbal or otherwise) out of our toolbox and toss it into the Atlantic, to sink down into the darkness forever after Rose's big dumb diamond.
So there are still problems in the marriage. What do we do?
I'll address pastors, but write with the assumption that all other interested parties are reading along. It won't be difficult to adjust and apply.
So here's the dilemma most pastors face most frequently. The person who's talking to you is unlikely to be the cause of the problems. I mean, look — show of hands, brothers: how many of you pastors have had a lady walk into your office and say, "You know, my husband's actually a pretty decent guy — loving, faithful, godly, devoted to me and the kids, hard-working... but I just can't seem to help verbally tearing him down to bloody shreds just about every chance I get. You got something for that?" Or how many men make an appointment to say, "My wife is an amazing lady. She's godly, incredibly competent and wise, treats me with love and respect, terrific mother... but I just like to spend every spare moment sitting around playing video games as if I was a no-account ten-year-old. Got some advice for me?"
No, in those situations, it would likelier be the husband or the wife (respectively) who's in the office, lamenting about the other's behavior. The other person doesn't have a problem — or so she thinks, so he thinks. But they aren't there. So, what's to say to the person who is actually in front of us?
Though conscious that my readership bristles with far wiser and better pastors than I, probably we all agree that the person we need to help is the person who's there. We won't really get anywhere talking at great length about the person who isn't. Right? Of course, if anyone has ideas about how to revolutionize the life of Party B by having a heart-to-heart with Party A, I'd love to hear it. I'll write a book. But meanwhile, on Planet Earth...
Not only can't we "fix" the absent party, we can't even really assess him. Remember Prov. 18:17? The soul before us could be a genuine suffering martyr, or (s)he could be a Suffering Martyr©, if you know what I mean. So whatever (s)he says about the other, we simply are not in a position to adjudicate, most of the time. Therefore, if we approach the time as "Sixty minutes to assign blame," it's likelier to be "Sixty minutes down the drain," isn't it?What to do? Just this:
Deal with the person in front of you. You have plenty to say to that person. For instance, check this and this and this, just for starters. If you'd just read those thoughtfully, we might be done here. But let me assume that you have, and add just a couple of specifics.
Let's say you're talking to a wife in a troubled marriage. I don't know that there's really any great payoff (for her, for God's glory) in spending much time debating the truth of her complaints. Is there? Wouldn't it work to say something like, "I'm sure you understand, only you and God and your husband was there when that happened. I don't have any personal knowledge. But let's say that everything is exactly 100% as you say it is..."
Then where do you go? First, isn't it the case that most of the things that enrage the wives who come in for help are complaints, and not sins? I'm not saying that complaints don't matter, I'm just saying let's categorize them. She's enraged or frustrated or depressed or distraught because of his communication, his use of his time, his habits — not his frequent acts of murder, his constant adultery, his serial thefts. Right?
Wouldn't it be wisdom then to ask her, "Is this a sin? Do you have a Bible verse telling me this is a sin?" And then, whatever the answer, wouldn't it be wisdom to ask, "Do you know what God tells you to do even when your husband is actually sinning — not just failing to live up to your expectations and preferences, but sinning?"
Then go to 1 Peter 3:1-6. Expound. Discuss. Apply. (I'll have more to say in just a tick.)
Perhaps it isn't the wife. Maybe you're talking to a husband in a troubled marriage. What do you do?
Much the same, only go to 1 Peter 3:6, and then perhaps to Ephesians 5:25ff., and Colossians 3:19. Expound. Discuss. Apply.And here's the point, bringing together those passages plus the articles linked above: be sure to point out that none of those passages is conditioned on the other person's behavior.* That is, the apostle never says, "Wives, respect and subordinate yourselves to your husband only when you agree with what he's doing." Nor does he ever say, "Husbands, you must love your wives as Christ loves the church when and only when you find her lovable, submissive and pleasant."
On the contrary, do not all the passages rather assume imperfection in the object loved? Peter does so explicitly; what of Christ in the church? Just think, for a moment, if Christ loved the church only when the church deserved His love — but at all other times He felt free to withdraw in sullen poutiness, or respond in kind? Think, I say, then shudder in horror, and be wiser.
As long as we are married to each other,** we are obligated — personally, individually, each of us — to do all that God says we are to do. He does not condition it on the other's behavior.
That truth is both heavily obligating and freeing. You don't need me to expound how I am obligated by it. But it frees me from trying to decide how to behave, whether to be loving-Christlike-husband guy or fridge-fisted-boxer-guy (verbally or physically). Simple: I'm never called to be fridge-fisted-boxer-guy. I'm always called to be loving-Christlike-husband guy, irrespective of how my wife treats me.
Then you begin to realize that all those verses you thought were out-there are suddenly right-in-here, verses like Matthew 5:9-12, 21-26, 38-48; 7:12; Rom. 13:10-21, and all the rest. They aren't for then. They're for right now, right here, in your marriage.
I know. It's not worldly wisdom. The flesh hates just about every word I've written.
But insofar as it is Biblical, it is wisdom.
*Well, you almost could argue that 1 Peter 3:1ff. is an exception, couldn't you — but in the other direction? In other words, Peter doesn't say, "If your husband does this good thing, you must then do that good thing." Rather, he says, "If your husband does this bad thing, you must then do that good thing."
**In this way, once again, I am removing divorce from this entire discussion. We aren't talking about whether and how and when to end a marriage. We're talking about how to think behave within a marriage.
04 June 2012
Inability and Responsibility
by Phil Johnson
ere's a bit of e-mail correspondence from someone who is adamantly opposed to the biblical (and Calvinistic) doctrine of total depravity. He insists that if sinners are spiritually unable to summon faith from their own hearts by their own free will, then they cannot be held responsible for their unbelief. Since we know they are responsible if they remain unrepentant, he says, we cannot say their depravity renders them unable to come to Christ in faith. Would God hold them responsible for something they are totally unable to do?
I cited the argument Jonathan Edwards makes in Freedom of the Will: that the sinner's problem is a "moral inability," not a "natural inability" (Edwards' words).
In other words, the problem with fallen humanity is not a physical incapacity or a lack of some intellectual, emotional, or rational faculty; it is that our wills are in bondage to sin. Fallen people sin willfully, not under compulsion or duress. They know full well what God's righteousness demands of them, and they refuse that duty, not because of factors beyond their control, but because they love sin and hate God. And it is that hatred of God that renders them unable to repent and trust Him.
Therefore the sinner's inability does not nullify (or even mitigate) his responsibility. He is without excuse (Romans 1:20).
My correspondent flatly rejected Edwards's distinction, appealing only to "common sense." "Inability is inability," he wrote.
The following exchange ensued between us. I've framed his messages in blue boxes:
ere's a bit of e-mail correspondence from someone who is adamantly opposed to the biblical (and Calvinistic) doctrine of total depravity. He insists that if sinners are spiritually unable to summon faith from their own hearts by their own free will, then they cannot be held responsible for their unbelief. Since we know they are responsible if they remain unrepentant, he says, we cannot say their depravity renders them unable to come to Christ in faith. Would God hold them responsible for something they are totally unable to do?I cited the argument Jonathan Edwards makes in Freedom of the Will: that the sinner's problem is a "moral inability," not a "natural inability" (Edwards' words).
In other words, the problem with fallen humanity is not a physical incapacity or a lack of some intellectual, emotional, or rational faculty; it is that our wills are in bondage to sin. Fallen people sin willfully, not under compulsion or duress. They know full well what God's righteousness demands of them, and they refuse that duty, not because of factors beyond their control, but because they love sin and hate God. And it is that hatred of God that renders them unable to repent and trust Him.Therefore the sinner's inability does not nullify (or even mitigate) his responsibility. He is without excuse (Romans 1:20).
My correspondent flatly rejected Edwards's distinction, appealing only to "common sense." "Inability is inability," he wrote.
The following exchange ensued between us. I've framed his messages in blue boxes:
|
But I've already given multiple examples to show that inability is not always morally exculpatory. Yet you are simply reasserting your original presupposition (that "inability is inability" and inability always rules out responsibility)—and your only defense of that claim is that it's "self-evident."
Well, it's not self-evident to me. If that's your best defense of Arminianism, your theology is in trouble.
Nevertheless, let me give one more example: Here's a man at a party who is so drunk he is unable to keep from wetting his pants. On the other hand, here's an infant who is unable to keep from wetting his diapers because he is only 10 days old.
Do you think the infant's inability is morally equivalent to the inability of the drunk?
Yes, because in either case, unless (according to Calvinism) God has regenerated the individual, he will simply be unable to believe, no matter his age or experience. So age and experience make absolutely no difference. What makes the difference, in Calvinism, is regeneration. But if you want to hold to a doctrine that views babies as hopelessly evil, created solely for the purpose of eternal torment, hey, knock yourself out.
See: "Common sense" actually forces us to acknowledge that there are different kinds of "inability," and inability per se does not necessarily absolve us from responsibility and guilt.
But Scripture commands sinners to believe. You simply cannot say they are unable to do what the Lord commands.
That argument is as biblically unsound as your original appeal to "common sense" was rationally deficient. God frequently commands us to do what we have no ability to do (cf. Matthew 5:48). And Scripture clearly teaches that sinners are unable to please God (Romans 8:7-8). They are nonetheless damned for their sin.
You need to rely more on the Bible and less on what seems reasonable to your rationalistic notion of "common sense."
Your "drunkard vs. baby" analogy simply does not hold water.
Nice accidental pun, but that wasn't an analogy. I was simply making the point that there is more than one kind of inability. The inability of the drunk is not morally equivalent to the inability of the infant. Trying to dodge that rather obvious point doesn't help the Arminian case, here.
But the man in your tale was not born drunk. It is not relevant as an analogy to human depravity.
Nonetheless, the comparison between that drunkard's incontinence and our fallenness is not as irrelevant as you suggest, because our sinful behavior shows that we are complicit with Adam in his rebellion. We cannot claim to be "innocent" victims of original sin, as you are trying to portray. Our sinful inability is more like that of the drunk than the infant. That is the very point Jonathan Edwards was making when he distinguished between moral and natural inability. Our inability is a moral defect, not a natural one. And therefore we are guilty because of it.
It works this way even in everyday life, too. You don't excuse a sluggard just because he was born with lazy tendencies, do you? Do you buy the claim that even homosexual behavior is OK because some people seem to be born with a constitutional attraction to people of the same gender?
I still say it is self-evident that the distinction you are trying to make is bogus.
Of course you do. It always comes down to that in Arminian theology, doesn't it? You just know inability nullifies responsibility, even though the Bible never says that, and even though plenty of verses could be cited to prove otherwise.
Thanks for the feedback, but I'd rather trust Scripture than your notion of what is "self-evident."
The bottom line is that unredeemed sinners are sinfully unable to do anything God demands of them (Romans 8:7-8). Yet God does hold them responsible for their disobedience. Your whole argument thus falls apart with your presuppositions.
03 June 2012
About those "Honest Doubts . . ."
Your weekly dose of Spurgeon
posted by Phil Johnson
WO pilots are alongside our vessel; each one is eager to seize the helm. Let us take stock of the rivals and their several works.
Faith in God has evidently steered many into a haven of personal rest, and their voyages have been grandly serviceable to that Humanity which we are nowadays so blandly invited to adore.
As for Doubt, that popular guide of man's youth, it has assuredly left the barques which it has boarded to drift to and fro like derelicts, without owner or harbour. When it has come on board our own vessel we have been all in a flutter till it has swaggered off again. Usefulness to humanity has come scantily enough from the skeptical principle. It has attempted nothing, and accomplished less.
"Weak to perform, though mighty to pretend."
Assuredly there will not be much lost if this popular gentleman called Doubt, who finds it needful ostentatiously to dub himself Honest, should be dropped overboard. He will not drown, and the yielding element will suit him.
Investigation, judgment, conscientious care, must ever be exercised; but the harpy of unbelief, perpetually defiling the sacred and tearing to pieces the useful, we cannot and will not endure. To live to jangle is no ambition of ours.
Plain common sense leads us to prefer virtue to vice, and, as a way to virtue, that same sense selects faith in God rather than incredulity. Surely it needs no surplus of wit to make this election. How can a man who has a right to be outside of Bedlam long debate which of the two to choose—the faith which sees the invisible God, or the blind unbelief whose highest glory is to know nothing?
posted by Phil Johnson
The PyroManiacs devote some space each weekend to highlights from The Spurgeon Archive.The following excerpt was a short item in the July 1884 issue of The Sword and The Trowel.
WO pilots are alongside our vessel; each one is eager to seize the helm. Let us take stock of the rivals and their several works.Faith in God has evidently steered many into a haven of personal rest, and their voyages have been grandly serviceable to that Humanity which we are nowadays so blandly invited to adore.
As for Doubt, that popular guide of man's youth, it has assuredly left the barques which it has boarded to drift to and fro like derelicts, without owner or harbour. When it has come on board our own vessel we have been all in a flutter till it has swaggered off again. Usefulness to humanity has come scantily enough from the skeptical principle. It has attempted nothing, and accomplished less.
"Weak to perform, though mighty to pretend."
Assuredly there will not be much lost if this popular gentleman called Doubt, who finds it needful ostentatiously to dub himself Honest, should be dropped overboard. He will not drown, and the yielding element will suit him.
Investigation, judgment, conscientious care, must ever be exercised; but the harpy of unbelief, perpetually defiling the sacred and tearing to pieces the useful, we cannot and will not endure. To live to jangle is no ambition of ours.
Plain common sense leads us to prefer virtue to vice, and, as a way to virtue, that same sense selects faith in God rather than incredulity. Surely it needs no surplus of wit to make this election. How can a man who has a right to be outside of Bedlam long debate which of the two to choose—the faith which sees the invisible God, or the blind unbelief whose highest glory is to know nothing?
31 May 2012
Assurance: Every Believer's Birthright
by Phil Johnson
was listening to a sermon by D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones not long ago in which he pointed out that assurance is one of the most prominent subjects in the New Testament. Virtually every New Testament epistle was written to address some doubt, answer some question, settle some uncertainty—all of them aimed at stimulating or reinforcing the assurance of believers. Scripture encourages us to have assurance. It is not inherently brash or presumptuous to be confident in your faith.
Shortly after reading that comment by Lloyd-Jones, while doing some research on a totally different theme, I had occasion to review The Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent. Trent was the Roman Catholic Council that was convened in the mid-1500s in order to hammer out an official response from the Roman Catholic Church to the Protestant Reformation.
And let's be candid: the Protestant Reformation had embarrassed the whole Roman Catholic hierarchy in a major way, because in addition to the many doctrinal errors and patently unbiblical and extrabiblical teachings the Reformers challenged, they also shone the bright light of biblical truth on centuries of exploitation of Papal power, gross corruption of the priesthood, spiritual abuse for material profit (including the sale of indulgences and the sale of church offices and political favors for money). Underneath all of this was the most shocking kind of moral rot that went right to the top in the Papal hierarchy. The Roman Catholic Church was totally corrupt.
The council of Trent cleaned up or papered over some of the more obvious exhibitions of rank clerical debauchery. At the very least we could say that Trent somewhat subdued the unbridled corruption of the medieval priesthood, after generations of abuse and corruption that were the hallmark of the priesthood right across Europe.
One other thing that the Council of Trent accomplished was this: They gave clear definition to certain Catholic doctrines that had always been rather hazy and abstruse—such as the doctrine of justification.
But fundamentally, the Council of Trent was a backlash against Protestant teaching.
The popes and bishops of the 16th century were not at all eager to convene a council to discuss the areas of church life and doctrine that needed Reform. It took years to get the council going. Meetings stretched out over about thirty years' time. The bishops convened in fits and starts, working more or less halfheartedly for the first couple of decades. Only in the council's final stages did they show any enthusiasm for the work. By then, they were so eager to antagonize the Protestants and their doctrines that they cranked out document after document pronouncing anathemas on the Reformers.
And in the process (mainly, I think, because they were more interested in countering the Protestants than they were in clarifying biblical truth on the issues they dealt with), they got major points of doctrine wrong in every set of decrees they issued.
For example, in their decree on the doctrine of justification (Council of Trent, Sixth session, chapter 9), they said this: "It is not to be said, that sins are forgiven, or have been forgiven, to any one who boasts of his confidence and certainty of the remission of his sins." In other words, while we can know with certainty that God does forgive sins, no individual can say with any settled certainty—based on faith alone—"My sins are forgiven." Even the priest's declaration of absolution is only good until the next time you sin.
The Council of Trent went on to draw this conclusion: "No one can know with a certainty of faith, which cannot be subject to error, that he has obtained the grace of God."
That's why no faithful Roman Catholic can ever really be sure of his or her salvation, even though they have thousands of priests in thousands of confessionals every day telling people that the sins they confess to the priests are forgiven. Those priests are giving people a deadly false assurance, and even Rome's official doctrine acknowledges that.
But Scripture says this (1 John 5:13): "You may know that you have eternal life." "The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God" (Romans 8:15). "Whoever believes in the Son of God has the testimony in himself. Whoever does not believe God has made him a liar" (1 John 5:10). We're supposed to "be . . . diligent to make [our] calling and election sure" (2 Peter 1:10). Far from saying what the Roman Catholic Church says, that it's sinful—even damnably evil—to be certain that our sins are forgiven and we have received the grace of God—Scripture says, "do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward" (Hebrews 10:35).
Scripture everywhere commends and encourages assurance. Nowhere are we taught to live in a state of perpetual doubt about our personal standing before God. Never does the Bible suggest that we should rely on the false promises of a mere man in a confessional booth who can never offer anything more than a kind of temporary absolution; a spiritual bait-and-switch offer that can never usher anyone into the true rest that is the birthright of those whose faith is authentic.
was listening to a sermon by D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones not long ago in which he pointed out that assurance is one of the most prominent subjects in the New Testament. Virtually every New Testament epistle was written to address some doubt, answer some question, settle some uncertainty—all of them aimed at stimulating or reinforcing the assurance of believers. Scripture encourages us to have assurance. It is not inherently brash or presumptuous to be confident in your faith.Shortly after reading that comment by Lloyd-Jones, while doing some research on a totally different theme, I had occasion to review The Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent. Trent was the Roman Catholic Council that was convened in the mid-1500s in order to hammer out an official response from the Roman Catholic Church to the Protestant Reformation.
And let's be candid: the Protestant Reformation had embarrassed the whole Roman Catholic hierarchy in a major way, because in addition to the many doctrinal errors and patently unbiblical and extrabiblical teachings the Reformers challenged, they also shone the bright light of biblical truth on centuries of exploitation of Papal power, gross corruption of the priesthood, spiritual abuse for material profit (including the sale of indulgences and the sale of church offices and political favors for money). Underneath all of this was the most shocking kind of moral rot that went right to the top in the Papal hierarchy. The Roman Catholic Church was totally corrupt.
The council of Trent cleaned up or papered over some of the more obvious exhibitions of rank clerical debauchery. At the very least we could say that Trent somewhat subdued the unbridled corruption of the medieval priesthood, after generations of abuse and corruption that were the hallmark of the priesthood right across Europe.
One other thing that the Council of Trent accomplished was this: They gave clear definition to certain Catholic doctrines that had always been rather hazy and abstruse—such as the doctrine of justification.
But fundamentally, the Council of Trent was a backlash against Protestant teaching.
The popes and bishops of the 16th century were not at all eager to convene a council to discuss the areas of church life and doctrine that needed Reform. It took years to get the council going. Meetings stretched out over about thirty years' time. The bishops convened in fits and starts, working more or less halfheartedly for the first couple of decades. Only in the council's final stages did they show any enthusiasm for the work. By then, they were so eager to antagonize the Protestants and their doctrines that they cranked out document after document pronouncing anathemas on the Reformers.
And in the process (mainly, I think, because they were more interested in countering the Protestants than they were in clarifying biblical truth on the issues they dealt with), they got major points of doctrine wrong in every set of decrees they issued.
For example, in their decree on the doctrine of justification (Council of Trent, Sixth session, chapter 9), they said this: "It is not to be said, that sins are forgiven, or have been forgiven, to any one who boasts of his confidence and certainty of the remission of his sins." In other words, while we can know with certainty that God does forgive sins, no individual can say with any settled certainty—based on faith alone—"My sins are forgiven." Even the priest's declaration of absolution is only good until the next time you sin.The Council of Trent went on to draw this conclusion: "No one can know with a certainty of faith, which cannot be subject to error, that he has obtained the grace of God."
That's why no faithful Roman Catholic can ever really be sure of his or her salvation, even though they have thousands of priests in thousands of confessionals every day telling people that the sins they confess to the priests are forgiven. Those priests are giving people a deadly false assurance, and even Rome's official doctrine acknowledges that.
But Scripture says this (1 John 5:13): "You may know that you have eternal life." "The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God" (Romans 8:15). "Whoever believes in the Son of God has the testimony in himself. Whoever does not believe God has made him a liar" (1 John 5:10). We're supposed to "be . . . diligent to make [our] calling and election sure" (2 Peter 1:10). Far from saying what the Roman Catholic Church says, that it's sinful—even damnably evil—to be certain that our sins are forgiven and we have received the grace of God—Scripture says, "do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward" (Hebrews 10:35).
Scripture everywhere commends and encourages assurance. Nowhere are we taught to live in a state of perpetual doubt about our personal standing before God. Never does the Bible suggest that we should rely on the false promises of a mere man in a confessional booth who can never offer anything more than a kind of temporary absolution; a spiritual bait-and-switch offer that can never usher anyone into the true rest that is the birthright of those whose faith is authentic.
Two marriage myths, busted
by Dan Phillips
As I continue in my announced intent to share a few bits of Biblical wisdom on marriage, it seems good to start by dispelling a couple of myths. Call me a Biblical "mythbuster."
First: it takes two to create marital problems. No, it doesn't. It only takes one.
It feels embarrassing even to have to say that, it's such a Biblically obvious point — but the notion of necessarily democratically-shared liability is so widespread that some air-clearing is necessary.
I think I'll call this the Democratic Causality Myth. How do I know it's a myth? The same way I know anything really important: the Bible. Didn't you read 1 Peter 2:19-20?
Peter's not done with that theme. Note that he says in 3:14a, "even if you should suffer for the sake of righteousness, you are blessed." There it is again: suffering precisely because one had done what was right.
Of course, we could add a heap of Scriptures, and they'd take us back to our Lord Himself, amid the Beatitudes: "Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven" (Matt. 5:10).
The assumption that all suffering must be immediately traceable to some specifically causative wrongdoing is simply not Biblical. It is to join hands and nod along with Job's divinely-discredited friends, as they doggedly pursue the etiology of Job's suffering, sure that he'd brought it on himself somehow.
So if we grant this for all of life, is there some force-field that un-trues the truth when it comes to marriage? Is it only in marriage that we must always split blame for suffering 50-50? I'd like to see that logic diagrammed.
Now let me hasten to say (if it isn't too late to "hasten") that the odds are that there never has been a troubled marriage involving one 100% flawless saint and one 100% culpable reprobate. And anyone who was trying to help a troubled couple would be a fool to overlook the wisdom of Prov. 18:17. We sinners being what we are (sinners, and rationalizing ones at that), the odds are that both parties in a struggling marriage have sin-patterns to deal with. You, the person in a troubled marriage, should start with that assumption.
But really — a woman's husband commits adultery. You immediately begin to search for what she did to bring this on herself? On what Biblical warrant? Even if you can find twelve things she did wrong as a wife, does that make his sin of adultery to any degree her fault? A man's wife incessantly tongue-lashes and emasculates him. First thing you do is start listing off his failure as a leader? On what Biblical warrant? Even if you can find twelve things he did wrong as a husband, does that make her sin of verbal assaults to any degree his fault?
Where was I when the Bible was changed (A) to relieve parties of 100% culpability for their own sin, and (B) to empower mere mortals to cause other mortals either to sin or do righteousness?
Let me also hasten to say that if you are in a troubled marriage, and your immediate thought is "Aha! I knew it! This proves I'm in the right!", you're not catching what I'm throwing. What I'm throwing, when we combine it wth the terrifying human capacity for rationalization of the most outrageous sins, is that you should start with the thought that you may be the one in the wrong.
In fact, let me develop that. Let's say a marriage is troubled. (Readers: "A marriage is troubled." Nice.) Let's say the biggest problem is a selfish, lazy man who is in no way a picture of Christ's sacrificial love for His church (Eph. 5:25ff.). You imagine the specifics. Let's say he agrees with his wife that they have a troubled marriage. Let's say she tries to talk to him about his behavior (the porn, the late nights out away from home night after night, whatever).
He retorts "It takes two to tango, honey. We've got problems, that means you've got problems. Let's talk about your problems."
What if she does have problems? What if she doesn't? It doesn't make any difference to his sin. Maybe she's sweeter than a ripe peach. Maybe she's a sour-mouthed, nasty, merciless harridan. What does that have to do with anything? He is contributing sin to the marriage because he is contributing sin to the marriage. Insisting on starting with her behavior, and hiding behind the democratic myth, is a sheer red-herring.
And in case I haven't made this clear, I am writing to you. I am not writing to your spouse. You (and I) need to own your (and my) sin, period, and not race for cover behind the democratic causality myth.
Second: an occasional knock-down, drag-out fight is good for a marriage. This is a great idea... well, apart from that whole thing about it being totally dead-wrong.
The Proverbs book has a long (60+ page) chapter on what Proverbs specifically, and the Bible as a whole, has to say about marriage. I tackle this particular myth in the course of that study. To wit:
This is followed by a sidebar, "Why Christian couples should never fight each other," Biblically detailing individual sets of reasons why neither husband nor wife should ever participate in a fight with the other. The reasons center around the Biblical description of what it means to married in general, and specifically what it means to be a husband or a wife. You can't be doing what God calls a husband or wife to do, and at the same time give yourself to fighting your spouse.
(And yes, I'm aware that clever minds can come up with valid "what-ifs" ["What if my husband is carrying a vial of deadly virus and intends to wipe out the population of Encino?"] — if a "what-if" that probably accounts for about 0.0001% of actual marital fights constitutes a valid exception.)
So. We can't assume that every marital problem has a 50-50 split. We can't solve our problem by trying to destroy our mate and force him or her to our will by verbal blunt-force trauma.
What should we do?
Next time.
As I continue in my announced intent to share a few bits of Biblical wisdom on marriage, it seems good to start by dispelling a couple of myths. Call me a Biblical "mythbuster."
First: it takes two to create marital problems. No, it doesn't. It only takes one.
It feels embarrassing even to have to say that, it's such a Biblically obvious point — but the notion of necessarily democratically-shared liability is so widespread that some air-clearing is necessary.
I think I'll call this the Democratic Causality Myth. How do I know it's a myth? The same way I know anything really important: the Bible. Didn't you read 1 Peter 2:19-20?
For this is a gracious thing, when, mindful of God, one endures sorrows while suffering unjustly. 20 For what credit is it if, when you sin and are beaten for it, you endure? But if when you do good and suffer for it you endure, this is a gracious thing in the sight of God.There you go: it is possible to suffer, not only in spite of doing good, but precisely for doing good. Peter expressly envisions a relationship where Party A causes suffering to Party B, and the latter not only did not "have it coming to him," but was specifically doing what he ought to be doing.
Peter's not done with that theme. Note that he says in 3:14a, "even if you should suffer for the sake of righteousness, you are blessed." There it is again: suffering precisely because one had done what was right.
Of course, we could add a heap of Scriptures, and they'd take us back to our Lord Himself, amid the Beatitudes: "Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven" (Matt. 5:10).
The assumption that all suffering must be immediately traceable to some specifically causative wrongdoing is simply not Biblical. It is to join hands and nod along with Job's divinely-discredited friends, as they doggedly pursue the etiology of Job's suffering, sure that he'd brought it on himself somehow.
So if we grant this for all of life, is there some force-field that un-trues the truth when it comes to marriage? Is it only in marriage that we must always split blame for suffering 50-50? I'd like to see that logic diagrammed.
Now let me hasten to say (if it isn't too late to "hasten") that the odds are that there never has been a troubled marriage involving one 100% flawless saint and one 100% culpable reprobate. And anyone who was trying to help a troubled couple would be a fool to overlook the wisdom of Prov. 18:17. We sinners being what we are (sinners, and rationalizing ones at that), the odds are that both parties in a struggling marriage have sin-patterns to deal with. You, the person in a troubled marriage, should start with that assumption.
But really — a woman's husband commits adultery. You immediately begin to search for what she did to bring this on herself? On what Biblical warrant? Even if you can find twelve things she did wrong as a wife, does that make his sin of adultery to any degree her fault? A man's wife incessantly tongue-lashes and emasculates him. First thing you do is start listing off his failure as a leader? On what Biblical warrant? Even if you can find twelve things he did wrong as a husband, does that make her sin of verbal assaults to any degree his fault?Where was I when the Bible was changed (A) to relieve parties of 100% culpability for their own sin, and (B) to empower mere mortals to cause other mortals either to sin or do righteousness?
Let me also hasten to say that if you are in a troubled marriage, and your immediate thought is "Aha! I knew it! This proves I'm in the right!", you're not catching what I'm throwing. What I'm throwing, when we combine it wth the terrifying human capacity for rationalization of the most outrageous sins, is that you should start with the thought that you may be the one in the wrong.
In fact, let me develop that. Let's say a marriage is troubled. (Readers: "A marriage is troubled." Nice.) Let's say the biggest problem is a selfish, lazy man who is in no way a picture of Christ's sacrificial love for His church (Eph. 5:25ff.). You imagine the specifics. Let's say he agrees with his wife that they have a troubled marriage. Let's say she tries to talk to him about his behavior (the porn, the late nights out away from home night after night, whatever).
He retorts "It takes two to tango, honey. We've got problems, that means you've got problems. Let's talk about your problems."
What if she does have problems? What if she doesn't? It doesn't make any difference to his sin. Maybe she's sweeter than a ripe peach. Maybe she's a sour-mouthed, nasty, merciless harridan. What does that have to do with anything? He is contributing sin to the marriage because he is contributing sin to the marriage. Insisting on starting with her behavior, and hiding behind the democratic myth, is a sheer red-herring.
And in case I haven't made this clear, I am writing to you. I am not writing to your spouse. You (and I) need to own your (and my) sin, period, and not race for cover behind the democratic causality myth.
Second: an occasional knock-down, drag-out fight is good for a marriage. This is a great idea... well, apart from that whole thing about it being totally dead-wrong.
The Proverbs book has a long (60+ page) chapter on what Proverbs specifically, and the Bible as a whole, has to say about marriage. I tackle this particular myth in the course of that study. To wit:
Perhaps you have heard the conventional wisdom that fighting is healthy for a marriage, that a little “clearing the air” (by means of a fight) is actually constructive and helpful. I have come to be absolutely convinced that this is a lie, and harmful one at that. A married couple should never fight.
By “fight,” of course, I do not mean “disagree,” nor do I mean have lively discussions nor debates. It is probably not only impossible, but positively undesirable that disagreements never take place in a marriage of two redeemed pilgrims on their way to—but not yet arrived at—the Celestial City. (More on that, later.)
Probably any couple knows when a disagreement becomes a fight. When lines are drawn up, tempers flare, hurtful accusations are hurled, and verbal blows are exchanged, a disagreement has degenerated into a fight. One opponent seeks to defeat the other, at almost any cost. Victory becomes the only goal. (p. 210)
This is followed by a sidebar, "Why Christian couples should never fight each other," Biblically detailing individual sets of reasons why neither husband nor wife should ever participate in a fight with the other. The reasons center around the Biblical description of what it means to married in general, and specifically what it means to be a husband or a wife. You can't be doing what God calls a husband or wife to do, and at the same time give yourself to fighting your spouse.(And yes, I'm aware that clever minds can come up with valid "what-ifs" ["What if my husband is carrying a vial of deadly virus and intends to wipe out the population of Encino?"] — if a "what-if" that probably accounts for about 0.0001% of actual marital fights constitutes a valid exception.)
So. We can't assume that every marital problem has a 50-50 split. We can't solve our problem by trying to destroy our mate and force him or her to our will by verbal blunt-force trauma.
What should we do?
Next time.
30 May 2012
The Case for Gay Marriage (1 of 3)
by Frank Turk
Yes: fine. We will beat you to death with this topic.
I enjoyed the last two weeks' discussion so well that I wanted to do it again on a related topic -- a very closely related topic. What I wanted to do was to compare and contrast the generic, secular view of monogamy and marriage to the Christian view of monogamy and marriage -- starting today with the secular view of marriage as exemplified by one video or essay by a secular person making the case for secular marriage.
Except -- get this -- I couldn't find one. I can't find any examples of people from the secular side of the map making the case for marriage in a way that, frankly, didn't seem like a parody.
So here's the deal: in the comments today, I am taking suggestions -- and only suggestions -- for the best in class for essays by secular writers which make the case of secular marriage. Post your link like this:
If we can find any secular cases for marriage, we'll talk about that. If we can't, we'll talk about that. This week: ball's in your court.
Yes: fine. We will beat you to death with this topic.
Except -- get this -- I couldn't find one. I can't find any examples of people from the secular side of the map making the case for marriage in a way that, frankly, didn't seem like a parody.
So here's the deal: in the comments today, I am taking suggestions -- and only suggestions -- for the best in class for essays by secular writers which make the case of secular marriage. Post your link like this:
<a href="http://url.com">Essay or Book Title Here</a> by Author Name.Type that in the comments with your link suggestion, and it will become a live link. All negative comments will be deleted. All caterwauling will be deleted. All spam, of course, will be deleted. TUAD's comments will be deleted preemptively because I just don't have that kind of patience this week. Mind your manners.
If we can find any secular cases for marriage, we'll talk about that. If we can't, we'll talk about that. This week: ball's in your court.
UPDATED: After 5 comments, I realized that my request is not clear enough. The title of this post is "The Case for Gay Marriage." Let me put it bluntly: there is no credible religious case for gay marriage. That means that somehow, the secular definition of "marriage" excludes (at least) the necessity that the people involved in any specific marriage need to be in male/female alignment.
I'm looking for the secular argument that makes marriage into the arrangement which the advocates for gay marriage are advocating for -- that is, what it is so that anyone would actually want to do that.
The resources listed so far (8:00 AM central time) are stellar. Please think about the topic and add your suggestions.
29 May 2012
Your marriage matters
by Dan Phillips
Though I've written often on marriage (like, oh, I don't know...say, this and this and this and, somewhat famously, this), I am returning to it from a number of angles, Lord willing. My hope is both to help couples, and to give an "assist" to fellow-pastors.
Here I just have a simple point to make: your marriage matters. Say, look; that's even the title!
"Matters" to whom? Well:
Though I've written often on marriage (like, oh, I don't know...say, this and this and this and, somewhat famously, this), I am returning to it from a number of angles, Lord willing. My hope is both to help couples, and to give an "assist" to fellow-pastors.
Here I just have a simple point to make: your marriage matters. Say, look; that's even the title!
"Matters" to whom? Well:
- It matters to God. Really, if I'm writing to actual Christians, we should be able to stop with this one, shouldn't we? You took vows invested with meaning He'd given to them, and He cares about that (Num. 30:2; Deut. 23:21-23; Pss. 61:8; 76:11; Prov. 20:25; Eccl. 5:5). He is invested in your marriage. He invented it, it's His institution, and you entered into it. It's an institution He cares a great deal about, and into which He has built great meaning (Eph. 5:22ff.). So, really, you think you can just tolerate your contributing to an unhealthy, non-optimal, cludgied-up marriage, and have that be OK with God? Seriously. Wake up.
- It matters to your spouse. You promised that man, that woman, that (s)he could trust you absolutely. Brother, you promised to lead and love and sacrifice, as Christ did for the church. Sister, you promised to respect and to subordinate yourself, as the church should do towards Christ. You told this person, "Though all else fail you, you can count on me. You can forget about looking for sex or love or devotion anywhere else. I'm your man/woman." You promised to make that the most important human relationship in your world. You think you can walk that promise back, and it has no harmful consequences? Seriously. Wake up.
- It matters to you. In more ways than you can think, it matters to you. Let's just start with the boneheadedly obvious: supposing you're in a marriage that is other-than-humming, and there's something you can do about it. But you're not. Why? You were going to get going on that when, exactly? When life really starts? Dude, sister, news flash: it started. When you get to Heaven? That's stupid. When the kids are grown? That's stupid, hateful, and irresponsible (see below). But really: you took public vows before God and everyone to make this the most important human relationship in your life -- and you're inattentive or neglectful towards it, or you tolerate in yourself a pattern of sin or fleshly indulgence that harms it? And you think that doesn't matter? Seriously. Wake up.
- It matters to your children. This is the saddest part. We all say we think it's the saddest part -- even people who tolerate and even cultivate marriage-harming sin in themselves pay lip-service to caring about The Children, while their lives show they care a whole lot more about unrepentantly indulging their flesh in this or that way. But kids see, they notice, they take note, they know at some level, and they are harmed. Not merely discouraged, distracted; harmed. Home should be a safe, healthy, Christward place for them. They get their ideas about marriage by watching yours. Suppose they see in you (we're not talking about your spouse, just you) a high doctrine of Scripture and swelling words about Christ, but a pattern of tolerating ongoing sin in yourself? You think that's not an eloquent and harmful lesson? You think they can just walk it off? Seriously. Wake up.
- It matters to your church. Maybe not right away, because it is possible to put on a good face for an hour or two a week. But you can't be giving yourself to godly, Spirit-led worship and service with a bunch of relative strangers if you're not obeying the great and the second commandment (see numbers 1 and 2, above) at home, can you? Does that make any kind of sense? Seriously. Wake up.
I plan to say a lot more with a lot more specifics. If you want a lot of Biblical study and content and counsel, you can get a head start right here, as perhaps some readers could attest. We won't be duplicating that content, but those are the woods in which, God willing, we'll do some picknicking.
26 May 2012
When the Preacher Gets Personal
A word about "individualism" and true evangelical convictions
Your weekly dose of Spurgeon
posted by Phil Johnson
n religion men love far rather to believe abstract doctrines, and to talk of general truths, than the searching inquiries which examine their own personal interest in it. You will hear many men admire the preacher who deals in generalities, but when he comes to press home searching questions, by-and-by they are offended.
If we stand and declare general facts, such as the universal sinnership of mankind, or the need of a Saviour, they will give an assent to our doctrine, and possibly they may retire greatly delighted with the discourse, because it has not affected them; but how often will our audience gnash their teeth, and go away in a rage, because, like the Pharisees with Jesus, they perceive, concerning a faithful minister, that he spoke of them.
And yet, my brethren, how foolish this is. If in all other matters we like personalities—if in everything else we look to our own concerns, how much more should we do so in religion? for, surely, every man must give an account for himself, at the day of judgment. We must die alone; we must rise at the day of resurrection one by one, and each one for himself must appear before the bar of God; and each one must either have said to him, as an individual, "Come ye blessed;" or else, he must be appalled with the thundering sentence, "Depart, ye cursed."
If there were such a thing as national salvation; if it could be possible that we could be saved in the gross and in the bulk, that so, like the sheaves of corn, the few weeds that may grow with the stubble, would be gathered in for the sake of the wheat, then, indeed, it might not be so foolish for us to neglect our own personal interests; but if the sheep must, every one of them, pass under the hand of him that telleth them, if every man must stand in his own person before God, to be tried for his own acts—by everything that is rational, by everything that conscience would dictate, and self-interest would command, let us each of us look to our own selves, that we be not deceived, and that we find not ourselves, at last, miserably cast away.
Your weekly dose of Spurgeon
posted by Phil Johnson
The PyroManiacs devote some space each weekend to highlights from The Spurgeon Archive. I was reminded of the following excerpt because of something Paul Washer said on Saturday at the Reformation Montana Conference. The excerpt is from "The Warning Neglected," a sermon preached at London's Metropolitan Tabernacle on Sunday morning, 29 November 1857.
n religion men love far rather to believe abstract doctrines, and to talk of general truths, than the searching inquiries which examine their own personal interest in it. You will hear many men admire the preacher who deals in generalities, but when he comes to press home searching questions, by-and-by they are offended.If we stand and declare general facts, such as the universal sinnership of mankind, or the need of a Saviour, they will give an assent to our doctrine, and possibly they may retire greatly delighted with the discourse, because it has not affected them; but how often will our audience gnash their teeth, and go away in a rage, because, like the Pharisees with Jesus, they perceive, concerning a faithful minister, that he spoke of them.
And yet, my brethren, how foolish this is. If in all other matters we like personalities—if in everything else we look to our own concerns, how much more should we do so in religion? for, surely, every man must give an account for himself, at the day of judgment. We must die alone; we must rise at the day of resurrection one by one, and each one for himself must appear before the bar of God; and each one must either have said to him, as an individual, "Come ye blessed;" or else, he must be appalled with the thundering sentence, "Depart, ye cursed."
If there were such a thing as national salvation; if it could be possible that we could be saved in the gross and in the bulk, that so, like the sheaves of corn, the few weeds that may grow with the stubble, would be gathered in for the sake of the wheat, then, indeed, it might not be so foolish for us to neglect our own personal interests; but if the sheep must, every one of them, pass under the hand of him that telleth them, if every man must stand in his own person before God, to be tried for his own acts—by everything that is rational, by everything that conscience would dictate, and self-interest would command, let us each of us look to our own selves, that we be not deceived, and that we find not ourselves, at last, miserably cast away.
25 May 2012
Another approach
by Frank Turk
[HOST]: What do so many of the churches have against homosexuals?
[FT]: I’m not sure what you mean.
[HOST]: I wrote a book about the gay rights movement because I was appalled by the oppression and the discrimination against homosexuals in my America. What about your church’s approach to homosexuals? Is it a sin? Are they going to Hell?
[FT]: Do you believe in Hell?
[HOST]: You can’t really answer a question with a question, Frank.
[FT]: No, but I also can’t answer a question I’m not sure I understand. You asked me if homosexuals are going to Hell – as if that’s an option, one possible outcome. Do you think it’s a possible outcome for anyone to go to Hell?
[HOST]: Well, I’m not a Christian. I don’t think in those terms.
[FT]: So why does it bother you that someone else might? See, here’s what I’m thinking: If I sat here and told you that I think, after our time here, that you’re going to Jupiter unless you agree with me, you’d think it was funny – even though I might honestly believe it, and going to Jupiter, even if possible, is an utterly unpleasant thing – too much gravity, no air, no water, no food. If you don’t agree with me, you’re going to Jupiter. Does that worry you?
[HOST]: No, but …
[FT]: yes?
[HOST]: That’s absurd. That’s minimizing my question for an absurd comparison. I’m asking you if you think there is anything morally wrong with Homosexuality.
[FT]: Yes, but you’re doing it by asking me about the ultimate consequence. That is: what happens to a homosexual? That’s a pretty scary way to ask me if I think homosexuality has some kind of moral value – right or wrong.
[HOST]: Well, let’s ask it that way, then: does Homosexuality have any moral value?
[FT]: Yes.
[HOST]: {pause} That’s it?
[FT]: Well, I think we agree on that statement – you do agree it has some kind of moral value, yes?
[HOST]: But we would disagree on the kind of moral value it has. In my view, there’s nothing wrong with it.
[FT]: So when two people of the same sex are in a relationship, and one of them has a sexual relationship with a third person who is also of the same sex, there’s nothing wrong with that?
[HOST]: {sigh} Of course not. Of course not – I’m not talking about infidelity, but homosexuality.
[FT]: You’re saying, then, that homosexual infidelity is not homosexuality? I’m not sure that makes any sense. Homosexuality is only monogamous behavior between two people of the same sex?
[HOST]: You’re still being a little coy – I’m not sure you’re being honest with me.
[FT]: I think I’m being brutally honest – and maybe a little unloving, but there’s a point that needs to be made here if we’re going to talk about the moral value of practice or inclination: it’s not fair at all to whitewash a thing in order to justify it. Look: at the root of your original question, you want to know why Christian people say Homosexuals are going to hell. Now, as it turns out, Christians are an odd lot because we also think heterosexuals are going to hell – Larry Flint, Hugh Hefner, Larry King, anyone you know who cannot stay faithful to their marriage, anyone who will not get married but sleeps around, people attached to porn rather than a spouse, etc. And most specifically: us. The thing we are really saying is that people are going to hell. So we can’t whitewash heterosexuality in order to justify it. And for you to set up homosexuality as the only thing we’re worried about in terms of sin is not entirely above-board.
[HOST]: Wait – you think everybody is going to hell?
[FT]: Do you believe in Hell?
[HOST]: {laughs, annoyed} you’re changing the subject. Just a simple yes or no: is everyone going to hell?
[FT]: Yes and no. Yes AND no.
[HOST]: OK – explain that.
[FT]: In my view – which is, it seems to me, the historically most-common Christian view – God is going to judge all people. Everyone – at the end of all things, God is going to judge the living and the dead. The Bible says the books will be opened and the lists of what we have done in our lives will be accounted for. And it also says that when we are under that kind of scrutiny, nobody can stand before the judgment of God – so in that sense, every single person is in danger of going to hell.
[HOST]: really.
[FT]: Yes. Unquestionably – because look: the world is the way it is because people want it to be this way. Here’s what I mean: we probably don’t want it to be as utterly disappointing as it is, but we all continue to do the things which we know, at some level, are wrong in spite of them being wrong. The piling up of that, day after day, makes the world the kind of place it is. It’s the kind of place where children die both of malnutrition and parental abuse. It’s the kind of place where people die old and alone. It’s the kind of place where hearts are broken, and life savings get wasted on stupid investments, and mothers are killed in car accidents, and sons and fathers are killed in war. It’s a place where people commit suicide.
The world is the way we have made it, and while we can find some good things in it, we all know that the problem of evil exists. And the problem of evil is us – not something apart from us.
[HOST]: and in your view, that means we are all going to hell?
[FT]: It means, for sure, that we all deserve it. And let me be clear about this: the problem at its root is not that we make other people suffer for our own desires. It is that God is offended by our disobedience toward him. The real, greater problem is that there is a God, and we don’t do what he wants us to do: we do what we want to do, and we love ourselves more than we love him.
[HOST]: So your religion is that everybody goes to hell?
[FT]: Nope – I said the answer is Yes AND No. Yes: we all deserve to go to Hell. But as it turns out, God will not stand for it and has done something for the sake of this disobedient and willful race of creatures we call mankind. We all deserve Hell, but Jesus Christ saves men from Hell.
[HOST]: So does Christ save homosexuals from hell?
[FT]: Well, do you believe in Hell? Because that’s not much of a question if you don’t believe in Hell.
[HOST]: Let’s say I do.
[FT]: I don’t want to put works in your mouth.
[HOST]: In your view of it, since you believe in Hell, does Christ save Homosexuals from Hell?
[FT]: Yes.
[HOST]: {pause} … and? … But?
[FT]: But what? Look: if we were talking about sex in general here, and I said to you, “everyone who has unprotected, serial casual sex will eventually get an STD – and the worst case is like Africa where AIDS is ravaging the population,” what would your reaction be? Either you’d believe that this is likely, or you’d doubt that the cause has that effect, right? Now: if you believe the cause has that effect, you have to ask: “so how can we be saved?” The state of things causes you to look for a solution – if you believe in the cause and effect. In this hypothetical case, the cause is causal sex and the effect is life-threatening diseases. And when you ask, “how can we be saved?” the answer can strike at any part of the problem. One solution would be to permanently keep all people segregated from each other so that there is no chance of sex ever – and that’s a pretty terminal solution. Not likely to catch on, prolly. Another solution is to somehow clean up the sex act so that there’s no disease involved – some sort of protection or vaccination or other form of attacking the actual diseases. Self control might be a solution – the idea that I can keep myself from doing stupid things with my body. But at the end of it, it seems to me that if we are honest, the solution can’t come from ourselves – because we are naturally the cause of the problem.
We need a solution. In fact, because the problem is not clinical, we don’t need a diagnosis and a treatment: we need a savior. And Jesus is that savior – for the heterosexuals, for the greedy, for liars, and to make sure I don’t discriminate against anyone, for the homosexuals.
[HOST]: So Jesus is the savior from Hell.
[FT]: Yes. If you believe in that sort of thing. If not, you shouldn’t be offended. The Apostle Paul said that if Jesus Christ did not die and raise from the dead, our faith is joke, and our so-called “Gospel” is a lie – we’re not to be admired, but pitied as utterly hopeless. If you don’t believe that Hell is a real place, and Jesus actually died for sin so that people don’t have to go there, then me or anyone telling you that homosexuals or republicans or anyone is going to hell shouldn’t upset you.
So do you believe in Hell?
[HOST]: What do so many of the churches have against homosexuals?
[FT]: I’m not sure what you mean.
[HOST]: I wrote a book about the gay rights movement because I was appalled by the oppression and the discrimination against homosexuals in my America. What about your church’s approach to homosexuals? Is it a sin? Are they going to Hell?
[HOST]: You can’t really answer a question with a question, Frank.
[FT]: No, but I also can’t answer a question I’m not sure I understand. You asked me if homosexuals are going to Hell – as if that’s an option, one possible outcome. Do you think it’s a possible outcome for anyone to go to Hell?
[HOST]: Well, I’m not a Christian. I don’t think in those terms.
[FT]: So why does it bother you that someone else might? See, here’s what I’m thinking: If I sat here and told you that I think, after our time here, that you’re going to Jupiter unless you agree with me, you’d think it was funny – even though I might honestly believe it, and going to Jupiter, even if possible, is an utterly unpleasant thing – too much gravity, no air, no water, no food. If you don’t agree with me, you’re going to Jupiter. Does that worry you?
[HOST]: No, but …
[FT]: yes?
[HOST]: That’s absurd. That’s minimizing my question for an absurd comparison. I’m asking you if you think there is anything morally wrong with Homosexuality.
[FT]: Yes, but you’re doing it by asking me about the ultimate consequence. That is: what happens to a homosexual? That’s a pretty scary way to ask me if I think homosexuality has some kind of moral value – right or wrong.
[HOST]: Well, let’s ask it that way, then: does Homosexuality have any moral value?
[FT]: Yes.
[HOST]: {pause} That’s it?
[FT]: Well, I think we agree on that statement – you do agree it has some kind of moral value, yes?
[HOST]: But we would disagree on the kind of moral value it has. In my view, there’s nothing wrong with it.
[FT]: So when two people of the same sex are in a relationship, and one of them has a sexual relationship with a third person who is also of the same sex, there’s nothing wrong with that?
[HOST]: {sigh} Of course not. Of course not – I’m not talking about infidelity, but homosexuality.
[FT]: You’re saying, then, that homosexual infidelity is not homosexuality? I’m not sure that makes any sense. Homosexuality is only monogamous behavior between two people of the same sex?
[HOST]: You’re still being a little coy – I’m not sure you’re being honest with me.
[FT]: I think I’m being brutally honest – and maybe a little unloving, but there’s a point that needs to be made here if we’re going to talk about the moral value of practice or inclination: it’s not fair at all to whitewash a thing in order to justify it. Look: at the root of your original question, you want to know why Christian people say Homosexuals are going to hell. Now, as it turns out, Christians are an odd lot because we also think heterosexuals are going to hell – Larry Flint, Hugh Hefner, Larry King, anyone you know who cannot stay faithful to their marriage, anyone who will not get married but sleeps around, people attached to porn rather than a spouse, etc. And most specifically: us. The thing we are really saying is that people are going to hell. So we can’t whitewash heterosexuality in order to justify it. And for you to set up homosexuality as the only thing we’re worried about in terms of sin is not entirely above-board.
[HOST]: Wait – you think everybody is going to hell?
[FT]: Do you believe in Hell?
[HOST]: {laughs, annoyed} you’re changing the subject. Just a simple yes or no: is everyone going to hell?
[FT]: Yes and no. Yes AND no.
[HOST]: OK – explain that.
[FT]: In my view – which is, it seems to me, the historically most-common Christian view – God is going to judge all people. Everyone – at the end of all things, God is going to judge the living and the dead. The Bible says the books will be opened and the lists of what we have done in our lives will be accounted for. And it also says that when we are under that kind of scrutiny, nobody can stand before the judgment of God – so in that sense, every single person is in danger of going to hell.
[HOST]: really.
The world is the way we have made it, and while we can find some good things in it, we all know that the problem of evil exists. And the problem of evil is us – not something apart from us.
[HOST]: and in your view, that means we are all going to hell?
[FT]: It means, for sure, that we all deserve it. And let me be clear about this: the problem at its root is not that we make other people suffer for our own desires. It is that God is offended by our disobedience toward him. The real, greater problem is that there is a God, and we don’t do what he wants us to do: we do what we want to do, and we love ourselves more than we love him.
[HOST]: So your religion is that everybody goes to hell?
[FT]: Nope – I said the answer is Yes AND No. Yes: we all deserve to go to Hell. But as it turns out, God will not stand for it and has done something for the sake of this disobedient and willful race of creatures we call mankind. We all deserve Hell, but Jesus Christ saves men from Hell.
[HOST]: So does Christ save homosexuals from hell?
[FT]: Well, do you believe in Hell? Because that’s not much of a question if you don’t believe in Hell.
[HOST]: Let’s say I do.
[FT]: I don’t want to put works in your mouth.
[HOST]: In your view of it, since you believe in Hell, does Christ save Homosexuals from Hell?
[FT]: Yes.
[HOST]: {pause} … and? … But?
[FT]: But what? Look: if we were talking about sex in general here, and I said to you, “everyone who has unprotected, serial casual sex will eventually get an STD – and the worst case is like Africa where AIDS is ravaging the population,” what would your reaction be? Either you’d believe that this is likely, or you’d doubt that the cause has that effect, right? Now: if you believe the cause has that effect, you have to ask: “so how can we be saved?” The state of things causes you to look for a solution – if you believe in the cause and effect. In this hypothetical case, the cause is causal sex and the effect is life-threatening diseases. And when you ask, “how can we be saved?” the answer can strike at any part of the problem. One solution would be to permanently keep all people segregated from each other so that there is no chance of sex ever – and that’s a pretty terminal solution. Not likely to catch on, prolly. Another solution is to somehow clean up the sex act so that there’s no disease involved – some sort of protection or vaccination or other form of attacking the actual diseases. Self control might be a solution – the idea that I can keep myself from doing stupid things with my body. But at the end of it, it seems to me that if we are honest, the solution can’t come from ourselves – because we are naturally the cause of the problem.
We need a solution. In fact, because the problem is not clinical, we don’t need a diagnosis and a treatment: we need a savior. And Jesus is that savior – for the heterosexuals, for the greedy, for liars, and to make sure I don’t discriminate against anyone, for the homosexuals.
[HOST]: So Jesus is the savior from Hell.
[FT]: Yes. If you believe in that sort of thing. If not, you shouldn’t be offended. The Apostle Paul said that if Jesus Christ did not die and raise from the dead, our faith is joke, and our so-called “Gospel” is a lie – we’re not to be admired, but pitied as utterly hopeless. If you don’t believe that Hell is a real place, and Jesus actually died for sin so that people don’t have to go there, then me or anyone telling you that homosexuals or republicans or anyone is going to hell shouldn’t upset you.
So do you believe in Hell?
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