Christianity « Kingdom People

June 1, 2009

Piper/Wright Summaries in Christianity Today

Filed under: Christianity, Reformed Theology — Trevin Wax @ 8:30 am

In the current (June) issue of Christianity Today, I have two articles detailing the current debate over the doctrine of justification between John Piper and N.T. Wright.

The first article is a summary of Wright and Piper’s positions. Many laypeople have heard about this debate, but are not familiar with the actual arguments employed by the authors. I wrote the summaries as a way of helping people see the two positions ”in a nutshell.” Both Piper and Wright looked over their respective summaries and made slight revisions for the final version.

The second article is entitled “Not an Academic Question,” and features quotes from a variety of pastors and teachers on both sides of this debate, indicating how the discussion has influenced the way they preach and teach. I compiled the responses, and Ted Olsen (managing editor for CT) put together the article.

Both of these articles will probably be online within the next few weeks, and I will link to them when they are available. In the meantime, I encourage you to pick up a print copy of Christianity Today’s June edition in order to take a look at the two articles. (The cover story is on Tim Keller’s ministry in Manhattan – and that alone is worth the price of the magazine.)

I look forward to your thoughts!

Comments (11)

May 19, 2009

The Future of World Magazine: An Interview with Marvin Olasky

Filed under: Christianity, Church Issues, Politics — Trevin Wax @ 3:16 am

When living in Romania, I always looked forward to the arrival of World magazine at the mailbox in our apartment building. Back then, the magazine was printed and mailed weekly, but international postal service slowed things down. I usually wound up with two or three copies at the same time (and several weeks late).

But I didn’t mind if the magazines came in bundles and were late. World was my way of staying on top of the cultural and political developments in the United States. I read each issue from cover-to-cover when it arrived, always intrigued by the conservative Christian perspective on the news.

Today, I am privileged to interview Dr. Marvin Olasky, the editor-in-chief for World. In this interview, I ask him about the history of this great magazine and the direction that World is headed. You can check out World online here.

Trevin Wax: Several Christian print publications have recently moved exclusively to online content. How is World doing during this economic recession and the current decline of printed news material?

Marvin Olasky: Our circulation is holding steady at a time when that of many other publications is declining so we’re grateful to God, and to our readers.

Trevin Wax: What is your role as editor-in-chief of World? What are some of your responsibilities?

Marvin Olasky: I try to look ahead and lead the staff in setting the overall course of the magazine, and I also try to write a lot. I used to read every article prior to publication, but editor Mindy Belz and managing editor Tim Lamer are terrific and I no longer have to do that.

Trevin Wax: The World Journalism Institute has been seeking to develop journalistic talent in young writers. How has this project gone? Are evangelicals making inroads into journalism outside of Christian circles?

Marvin Olasky: No major inroads in print publications or broadcast media, but given time there may be. The new frontier is electronic, of course, and I’m hopeful that we’ll see some strong inroads there.

Trevin Wax: I have long admired World for publishing letters to the editor that are quite critical – either of political stances or cultural engagement (movie reviews, etc.). What have been some of the more controversial positions that World has taken throughout the years?

Marvin Olasky: The two most controversial were probably our exposure and criticism of plans to make the NIV a “gender-neutral” Bible in 1997, and our exposure and criticism of Ralph Reed’s involvement with the corrupt deeds of lobbyist Jack Abramoff in 2005 and 2006. We’re journalists, but some Christian organizations expect us to do public relations for them, and when we don’t, some sparks always fly.

Trevin Wax: How is World different today than when it began?

Marvin Olasky: Bigger and I hope better, with a firm embrace of biblical objectivity, but with the same theological principles.

Trevin Wax: Where do you see World in ten years? What changes should readers expect? In what direction is the magazine headed?

Marvin Olasky: We’ll continue to be faithful to the Bible, I hope and pray, with some new, young writers and editors grafted into World. We’ll continue to expand our online presence and will try to be ready to respond to technological changes that may surprise all of us.

To find out more about World magazine or to request a subscription, click here.

Comments (5)

January 29, 2009

Is Religion Necessary to Society? My Take on the Pope’s Debate with Habermas

Filed under: Book Reviews, Christianity — Trevin Wax @ 3:34 am

habermas1 Yesterday, I summarized the brief debate between Jurgen Habermas and Pope Benedict XVI regarding the role of reason and religion in secular society. (The two papers are included in the book The Dialectics of Secularization: On Reason and Religion.) Today, I’d like to follow up with a few comments about this dialogue.

My Take on the Habermas/Ratzinger Debate

It is surprising to see Benedict and Habermas finding common ground on the role of religion in secular society. Both of them see the need for religion and reason to listen and learn from one another.

But despite the similarities in their practical solutions, there are several substantive differences in their outlooks which should not be overlooked.

Reason’s False Sense of Superiority

First, Benedict is right to point out that it is unfair to speak only of pathologies of religion without considering the danger of “pathologies of reason.” This tendency for reason to be unaware of its limitations is demonstrated in Habermas’ essay.

Consider Habermas’ proposal that we translate religious concepts into the language of secular principles. Surely some good can come from such a proposal.

But it is clearly one-sided for Habermas to see the need for religion to be translated into secular terms without ever advocating that secular principles be translated into religious terminology. His view presupposes the superiority of rationalism over religion, and this sense of secular superiority is demonstrated by his view that religious principles should shed their religious connotations in order to better suit secular society.

The example that Habermas uses is the religious concept of “the image of God in man” being spoken of as “the identical dignity of all men that deserves unconditional respect” (45). It is true that this kind of conversion from sacred to secular terms can be helpful to some extent.

But this kind of conceptual conversion cannot avoid “emptying” religious concepts of their significance. Indeed, the equation of “the image of God in man” with “human dignity” translates the horizontal aspect of the “divine image” teaching quite well. But the secular form does not grapple with the God in whose image we are made.

When Christians affirm that human beings are created in the image of God, they are indeed speaking of the dignity and worth of all human life, but they are also affirming something about God. When religious language is translated into rationalist, secular terms, it is inevitable that the religious teachings will be emptied of their vertical dimension. Thus, the translation process advocated by Habermas subjugates religiosity to rationalism.

Can Secularism Sustain Itself?

Secondly, it is encouraging to read that Habermas believes religion can serve as a support for secular democracy. This affirmation is a move in the right direction in that it notices a certain pragmatic value in religion – religion’s power to sustain the solidarity of the citizenry.

But Habermas never addresses the current crisis taking place in non-religious Europe. European birth rates are falling in secular societies, as citizens apparently cannot find sufficient reasons to put family and children ahead of their own self-interests. This rampant individualism is causing secular society to crumble before our eyes.

Habermas is right to recognize the role that religion can play in supporting and sustaining democracy, but he fails to see that the presence of religion is a necessity for society. Religion provides the impetus for self-sacrifice and personal communication that marriage and family need in order for society to survive.

The Need for non-Western Resources

Benedict hints at a solution to this weakness in Habermas’ view by encouraging secular society to look to non-Western sources for renewal and strengthening. The narrow vision of many secularists inclines them to see secular society as the pinnacle of human flourishing.

Benedict points out the complementary relationship between reason and faith found outside the West and advocates a more inclusive view that is open to learning from non-Western societies.

Conclusion

The Dialectics of Secularization features an engaging debate by two world-renowned scholars on the role of reason and religion in secular democracy. Though Habermas and Benedict address the subject from different angles, both men demonstrate a willingness to see reason and religion in complementary, rather than competing roles.

Comments (4)

January 28, 2009

The Pope vs. Habermas: Reason & Religion in Secular Society

Filed under: Book Reviews, Christianity — Trevin Wax @ 3:24 am

Many people may wonder why a small book like The Dialectics of Secularization: On Reason and Religion matters. After all, the authors, Jürgen Habermas and Joseph Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict XVI), discuss the nature of ethics in secular society by appealing to highly sophisticated arguments that include long sentences packed with meaning.

But these kinds of discussions, which usually take place in the upper echelons of society, publicize thoughts and concepts which eventually yield wide-ranging implications for the rest of society. The Dialectics of Secularization is comprised of two papers presented in January 2004 concerning “the pre-political moral foundations of a free state.” In these papers, Jürgen Habermas and Pope Benedict XVI reflect on the basis for ethics in society.

Today, I wish to briefly summarize the main themes of the Habermas / Ratzinger dialogue. Tomorrow, I will interact with some of the authors’ suggestions.

What Habermas Thinks

Habermas begins by asking if a democratic constitutional state can “renew from its own resources the normative presuppositions of its existence” (21). He wonders whether or not there is a way to provide justification for political rule that does not find its grounding in religious categories.

Against those who see religion as necessary to sustain the constitutional system, Habermas argues that “systems of law can be legitimated only in a self-referential manner, that is, on the basis of legal procedures born of democratic procedures” (27). In other words, legitimacy comes from legality.

Habermas recognizes that solidarity among the citizenry is needed for secular society to sustain itself. But religious or metaphysical traditions need not be the providers of this solidarity (29). Instead, the democratic process itself can serve as the “uniting bond” that mobilizes the participation of its citizens (32). Likewise, patriotism can sustain solidarity once the principles of justice enshrined in the law have time to penetrate the culture’s ethics (33-34).

Habermas warns about external threats to secular society. Once citizens act in isolation based solely upon self-interest, they use their subjective rights against one another. As the markets and the power of bureaucracy continue to weaken social solidarity, Habermas recognizes the need for a bridge to certain religious traditions (42).

Habermas sees philosophy and theology as intertwined. He believes philosophy can translate religious terms into secular principles without completely emptying them of their substance. Now that societal solidarity appears to be under threat, Habermas recommends that the constitutional state “deal carefully with all the cultural sources that nourish its citizens’ consciousness of norms and their solidarity” (46).

Believers and unbelievers must work together, expecting dissent and disagreement, while affirming the right of both to make contributions (whether in secularized or religious language) to public debates (50-51).

What Pope Benedict Thinks

Pope Benedict XVI (hereafter “Benedict”) begins his lecture by showing how we now find ourselves on the threshold of seeing the formation of a global community and a new era of human capabilities. Despite recent advances in technology and scientific discovery, Benedict is troubled by the dissolution of ethical certainties regarding “the good,” and he believes that science cannot offer adequate answers about the existence and purpose of man (55-57).

Benedict spends a good deal of time reflecting on the relationship between power and law. “It is the specific task of politics to apply the criterion of the law to power, thereby structuring the use of power in a meaningful manner,” he writes (58).

But how does the law come to be? How can the law keep from becoming a mere benefit of those who are already in power? Benedict believes there are “self-subsistent values that flow from the essence of what it is to be a man, and therefore inviolable” (61).

Today, new developments are forcing us to grapple with issues concerning the use and abuse of power. The onset of terrorist activity (with religious fanaticism as one of its sources) has proven that it no longer takes a large-scale war to greatly impact the culture.

Likewise, our current capability to create humans raises questions about the ethical dimension of turning human beings into mere products. The invention of the atomic bomb and the arrival of test-tube babies should cause us to “doubt the reliability of reason” (65). But who or what can regulate human reason?

Benedict focuses on human rights and includes within that phrase “a doctrine of human obligations and of human limitations” (71). He counters Habermas’ belief that strict rationality is sufficient to bind people together. Instead, he appeals to the Christian understanding of reality as providing a powerful impetus for human rights in the world. He points out the weakness of the rationalist view, evidenced by its inability to demonstrate its foundational principles in contexts outside the West (76).

Despite the differences between Benedict and Habermas, both men advocate the adoption of similar practices. Benedict readily admits that there are “pathologies in religion” among the fanatical extremes of religious groups. These pathologies need reason to purify and structure them. But on the flip side, he believes there are pathologies of reason too, and religion can serve as a guardian that keeps reason within its proper limits. Benedict hopes that Western culture will listen and accept a “genuine relatedness” to other cultures (78-79).

Tomorrow, I will interact with the arguments of Habermas and Benedict…

Comments (6)

December 8, 2008

Advent: A Time to Long for God’s Justice

Filed under: Christianity, Red Letters — Trevin Wax @ 3:42 am

He shall not judge by what his eyes see,
or decide disputes by what his ears hear,
but with righteousness he shall judge the poor,
and decide with equity for the meek of the earth;
and he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth,
and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked.
Righteousness shall be the belt of his waist,
and faithfulness the belt of his loins.
- Isaiah 11:3-5

The prophet Isaiah told the people of Israel to expect a Messiah who would bring justice to the world.

Think about what the world would be like if there was complete and total justice. A world where everything is made right, a world where everything works out, where societies function fairly. A world where we do what we know we’re supposed to.

A sense of justice is knit into our humanity. That’s why it can be painful to watch the injustice around us. Perpetrators of terrible crimes get off. Some people buy their way out of prison. Victims are abused, and sometimes the criminals never get caught.

In Romania, I came to know people lived under the thumb of a dictator who had made life a living hell for most of the citizens. Then, after Communism fell, the new leaders were just as unjust and corrupt as the previous regime. Government couldn’t bring justice to the nation!

And somehow, even as we cry out for justice, even as we are thirsty and hungry for justice (Jesus promises that those who hunger and thirst for justice will one day be filled) – we know that the line between injustice and justice isn’t just a matter of us versus them. The line of good and evil runs right through each of us. We ourselves are both just and unjust. The evil we see in others is present in ourselves. The evil we see perpetrated against us is often the same evil that we manifest towards other people.

So now, the justice of God is not only a comforting thought (imagine a world of perfect, fairness, righteousness and justice); it’s also a scary thought. Will we be able to inhabit such a world? If God is fair and righteous and just, then we realize that our hope for God’s justice brings us to the point where we too must face the punishment and penalty for our unfairness, unrighteousness, injustice.

Two sides to one coin. Relief on the one hand and horror on the other.

Of course, the farther we travel on our journey with Jesus, the more we discover that Jesus not only brings the justice we desire, but he provides the justice we need in order to be part of God’s new world. He dies an unjust death, paying the penalty for our sinful injustice, and in the same moment, he clothes us in the fullness of God’s righteousness.

Prayer: God of Israel, you judge the peoples with fairness. You are the God in whom we find the standard of righteousness and justice. Comfort us when we are the victims of injustice. Forgive us for the sins we commit against others. Thank you for the perfect righteousness of your Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord.

Comments (3)

December 4, 2008

God at Work

Filed under: Christianity — Trevin Wax @ 3:25 am

Whenever I drive north towards Louisville, I inevitably get caught up in the road construction on I-65 that is being conducted right as you cross over into Kentucky.

All over the place, you see signs that say, “Men at work.” That sign lets me know that the going might get rough for a time. We’re going to have to slow down.

Oftentimes, we need to be reminded that God is at work too. As we travel down the bumpy roads of life, facing hardships and struggles, we might wonder where God is. What is he doing?

We see destruction and pain and sorrow and begin to ask: What is his plan?

In moments like these, the testimony of the Bible serves as a sign in the middle of life construction: GOD AT WORK.

So even as planes crash into the World Trade Center: “God at Work.”

Beneath the rubble left over from the earthquake: “God at Work.”

As you’re taking your child into the hospital for chemotherapy, “God at work.”

As you bury your loved ones, “God at Work.”

As your husband walks out on you, “God at work.”

As you lose your job, “God at work.”

As you suffer through a depression, “God at work.”

You might be tempted to say, “No! I can’t believe that God is at work in the midst of this! This place is too unlikely!”

Perhaps the disciples thought the same as Jesus was arrested and flogged and crucified.

Do you see? It is the cross that turns our expectations upside down. The most horrific injustice the world has ever seen was the means through which God accomplished his plan of redemption.

God is at work in the most unlikely of places, through the most unlikely of people. The question is not whether or not he is working. The question is this: Do we trust him?

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December 1, 2008

Advent: A Time for Anticipation and Repentance

Filed under: Christianity — Trevin Wax @ 3:22 am

In those days John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea,
“Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”
For this is he who was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah when he said,
“The voice of one crying in the wilderness:
‘Prepare the way of the Lord; make his paths straight.’”
Matthew 3:1-3

One of my favorite moments in C.S. Lewis’ The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe is when the beavers tell the Pevensie children that Aslan (the great Lion – and Christ figure of the book) is “on the move.” In other words…

Something is up.

The prophecies are coming true.

The moment we’ve been waiting for is here.

John the Baptizer’s role is much like that of the beavers in the Narnia book. He is telling Israel to get ready. God is up to something! The promises are coming true. The Messiah – God’s anointed King – is coming!

Advent is a time of preparation for the Messiah’s coming. We put ourselves in the place of the faithful Jews of the first century, awaiting with eager expectation for God to act decisively to forgive sins, to end their exile, to restore the world. And yet, we also await the Messiah’s return – Jesus’ Second Coming.

How do we prepare for Jesus’ coming? We would do well to follow John the Baptizer’s command: Repent!

Prayer: Almighty God, give all of us grace to cast away the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light, now in the time of this mortal life in which you Son Jesus Christ came to visit us in great humility; that in the last day, when he shall come again in his glorious majesty to judge both the living and the dead, we may rise to the life immortal; through him who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.

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October 14, 2008

Book Review: The Story of Christianity

Filed under: Book Reviews, Christianity — Trevin Wax @ 2:33 am

Are you looking for one book that encapsulates the most important moments and people in Christian history? Look no farther than The Story of Christianity (2007 Hendrickson Publishers, 1984-85) by Justo L. Gonzalez. You can purchase this book in either one volume or two.

The Story of Christianity is just that – a story. Gonzales has written an engaging textbook that traces Christianity’s history from the early church to the present day. Yes, this book is long. It’s historical. Like all textbooks, it drags in certain places.

But Gonzales rarely delves into unnecessary details. His restraint keeps the book moving, but he wisely includes certain short stories or events that keep the narrative fresh.

The Story of Christianity is a seminary textbook that I have truly enjoyed. Gonzales does an admirable job of making church history interesting and accessible for seminary students. He is also fair. It must be difficult for a historian to keep his prejudices from influencing his work too much. But Gonzales does well, despite a few places where his theological outlook comes to the forefront. (Example? Gonzales seems to see the World Council of Churches of the 20th century as the pinnacle of Christian success.)

Gonzales succeeds in hitting all the highlights of Christian history - an impressive feat considering the outward geographical expansion of Christianity. Sometimes he tries to fit too much history into one chapter. The narrative becomes confusing at times, but this confusion is sometimes brought about by the confusion of the times (The story of the Reformation in the Low Countries, for example.)

Overall, The Story of Christianity is a fine piece of work. I suspect that like other good church history books, this one will be in print for many decades to come.

Comments (3)

September 2, 2008

Truth is Beautiful

Filed under: Christianity, Emerging Church, Preaching, Theology — Trevin Wax @ 3:04 am

“That book of systematic theology is just a bunch of crap.”

I was sitting across from a bright, young college student, who was telling me why he was enamored with the Emergent movement. (Ironically, just before expressing his disdain for a popular theology book, he had told me that it was the humility of the Emergent advocates that had first attracted him.)

I asked my friend why he had such a problem with books about theology. “I tried to read some of it. I was so bored. There was nothing inspiring in it at all.” Coming to the theologian’s defense, I reminded my friend that looking for a warm fuzzy from a systematic theology textbook is like hoping to be inspired by the encyclopedia. Different books for different purposes.

But my conversation with this young college student caused me to reflect. My friend said he had been attracted to Emergent Village because of the inspiring nature of the theological conversation. The stories fired up his imagination. He came to believe that those of us in the more traditional camp unthinkingly cling to a bunch of uninspiring, dead doctrines.

When our lunch was over, I did not feel compelled to abandon my theological convictions and subscribe to the narrow-minded liberalism that is becoming increasingly characteristic of Emergent.

But I did come away with a lesson I hope to apply the rest of my life: Truth is beautiful. And if truth is beautiful in and of itself, then surely our presentation of truth should be beautiful as well.

In our postmodern age, it is not only important to make the case that a certain belief is true. We also need to make the presentation of that truth beautiful.

I realize now that I have never given much thought to the beauty of truth.

How many times have I sought to win an argument by running down a list of Bible verses without pointing to the beautiful picture of the Bible’s complete storyline?
How often have I pointed to the biblical evidence and historical precedent for believing in biblical inerrancy without painting the grander picture of a perfect God, condescending to humans in our language and yet who always tells the truth?
How many times have I taught about the attributes of God without telling stories about God’s character that illuminate and reveal the beauty of our unchanging Father?
How many times have I dealt with heavy issues of suffering and pain purely from an intellectual standpoint, not allowing the beauty of Christ’s willingness to suffer on the cross to inform my presentation?

On Trinity Sunday this year, I prepared a lesson for my Sunday morning class of 20-somethings about why we believe in the Trinity. At first, my goal was to arm them with Scripture so that they could debate a Jehovah’s Witness or a Oneness Pentecostal into the corner with Bible verses proving the Trinity.

But as I came to the end of my preparation, I felt something was missing. I could present the biblical proofs for the doctrine of the Trinity, but I felt I also needed to show why God’s Triune nature is beautiful.

The Trinity is more than a bare doctrine we can prove with a few Scripture verses. The Trinity is beautiful truth about God. The Trinity satisfies the yearning that we have for knowing God personally. We believe that the three Persons of the Trinity continuously pour out love to one another and receive love in return. The only way that “God is love” can be true is if God existed as a perfect community of self-giving love long before God had a creation to shower his love upon.

My lesson on the Trinity did indeed focus on the Bible passages that inform the doctrine of God. But I packaged those Bible truths within the awe-inspiring picture of the three Persons of the Trinity pouring out continuous love from eternity past.

The knowledge of God’s truth makes me want to know more about the Trinity; the beauty of God’s truth causes me to want to know the Trinity more personally and more deeply.

Do you ever wonder why stories often have a greater impact than debating the theological minutia of Bible interpretation?

C.S. Lewis could have written a fine theological treatise on what the world would have been like had Adam and Eve never sinned. But Perelandra worked much better. Lewis could have (and sometimes did) describe in colorful theological language the nature of the atonement, but Aslan sacrificing his life for rebellious Edmund fired up our imaginations. In his advice to aspiring writers, Lewis reminded them to describe truths vividly – not merely multiplying adjectives, but working hard to help people feel the beauty of the truths presented.

When I consider the phenomenal success of The Shack, the seminarian in me rises up and wants to make a detailed list of the book’s many theological aberrations. But perhaps the greater challenge for someone like me is to recognize the power of a good story and then to take a bestseller like The Shack as an incentive to write better stories.

Those of us who are decidedly in the Un-Emergent camp should not be smug in what we believe is theological accuracy. Getting our doctrines right is good. Systematic theologies are a terrific way to express those doctrines with precision. Debating the intricacies of Christian theology has its place (and I gladly take part in such discussions at times!).

But we need to make sure that our presentation of God’s truth is as beautiful as the truth itself. The Christian story is beautiful precisely because it is true.

True information without any inspiration leads to dead orthodoxy.

Inspiration without true information leads to heresy.

I hope to always be one who proclaims the truth beautifully.

Truth that is biblical.

Truth that is beautiful.

Truth that inspires.

Comments (10)

August 12, 2008

Bedtime Prayers with our Children

Filed under: Christianity, Prayers — Trevin Wax @ 3:00 am

Do you ever feel you are failing to teach your children to pray?

The days are hurried. The more kids you have, the more difficult it is to gather everyone together for family prayer. When your child does start to pray, it’s the same prayer every night. You wonder how much he or she is praying from the heart and how much of their prayer is merely a formality. You yourself are exhausted from your efforts. Sometimes, it just seems like taking a few minutes every night to pray is too much.

Let me encourage you. Young children soak in everything we say to them. Don’t be frustrated if they’re not reciting the catechism by the age of 4. Don’t be frustrated if they seem to be disinterested when you pray. Don’t be frustrated by their lack of attention span.

Pray anyway.

Our son has learned the Apostles’ Creed, the Lord’s Prayer, and other Psalms merely through repeating certain prayers each night. No, we have not tested his memory or promised him certain rewards for praying fervently. Mere repetition does it all.

Quote Psalm 23 to your children every night for two weeks and you’ll be amazed at how quickly they can say it with you… word for word. Rather than seeing repetition as something that stifles prayer, we’ve discovered in our home that repetition is the best way to pray with a young child.

If this is any help at all, I’m including our usual nightly prayers that we say over our children:

Our Nightly Prayers

We gather as a family in our son’s room, turn the lights down, and kneel by his bedside (most of the time). By the way, I recommend you have these prayers memorized before you start teaching them. It will be more effective than reading them from a book. Furthermore, it will spur you on to greater efforts in memorizing.

Apostles’ Creed (with motions) – We quote the updated one (click here), and we use hand motions as well. Our son loves the story of Christ, especially “on the third day, he ROSE AGAIN!!!” (insert brief moment of bed-jumping here.)
May the Lord Almighty grant us and those we love a peaceful night and a perfect end.
Our help is in the Name of the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth. (Psalm 124:8)
Confession: Almighty God, our heavenly Father, we have sinned against you, through our own fault, in thought, word and deed, by what we have done, and by what we have left undone. For the sake of your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, forgive us all our offenses, and grant that we may serve you in newness of life, to the glory of your name, Amen. (The Book of Common Prayer)
Gloria: Glory to the Father, to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now and will be forever, Amen.
Bible Memorization: Choose a psalm or a Bible passage you want your kids to know by heart. Quote it here for a few weeks.
The Lord’s Prayer: We use the ESV.
Into your hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit, for you have redeemed me, O Lord, O God of truth. Keep me, O Lord, as the apple of your eye. Hide me under the shadow of your wings. (Psalm 17:8, 31:5)
Personal, spontaneous prayers: Each member of the family prays for a minute or two whatever is on our hearts.

It may seem like such a prayer program would take a long time. It doesn’t. Usually, we’re finished praying within 5-10 minutes. But the impact on our family has been great. When I was away from home last month, my son asked my wife to call me, put me on speakerphone and let me lead the family in prayers long-distance before he went to bed.

What kinds of prayer practices have you found effective with your children?

Comments (30)

May 27, 2008

Maria Chapman Memorial Service

Filed under: Christianity — Trevin Wax @ 9:52 pm

A moving news video featuring Steven Curtis Chapman and family at the memorial service for their daughter, Maria. We grieve with those who are grieving, and yet we grieve with hope.

HT – Zach Nielsen

Comments (1)

May 7, 2008

Should Christians Be Ecumenical?

Filed under: Christianity, Church Issues — Trevin Wax @ 4:09 am

Ecumenism.

Depending on your background and your experiences, that word may cause your heart to beat faster with hope at what possibilities for unity in the Christian Church might exist. Or it may cause your beat faster because of the alarm bells going off in your mind.

Recently, Charles Colson, in promoting his new book The Faith, answered a probing question by Tim Challies regarding his involvement with Evangelicals and Catholics Together and the importance of “justification by faith alone” as integral to the gospel. Challies pointed out that the doctrine is considered anathema by official Roman Catholic teaching.

Colson defended his work with Evangelicals and Catholics Together, claiming that his ecumenical pursuits reveal how many Catholic leaders align closely with the Protestant position. Colson asked for patience as the structure of the Roman Church eventually came to reflect the beliefs of some of its prominent spokespersons.

I put a similar question to N.T. Wright, Bishop of Durham in November of last year. Bishop Wright answered similarly to Colson, claiming that it is difficult to perceive just what Catholics actually teach on this issue. He related his own experience of a Catholic theologian articulating his position in such a way that any Protestant would have been satisfied.

Can evangelicals and Catholics truly be together?

Is there any kind of consensus on the doctrine of justification by faith alone?

What kind of unity can evangelicals and Catholics share?

It seems to me that there are three ways to answer this question, and we evangelicals need to recognize each of these avenues in order that we might talk to each other instead of past each other.

Evangelical Christians can set aside the ecumenical task completely, arguing that even if the Roman Church were to change its official teaching on justification, there are too many other hurdles to overcome. For this group, ecumenism is equal to compromise. Therefore, it should not be pursued.
Evangelical Christians can only pursue unity with Roman Catholics once the official teaching of the church reflects the truth about the doctrine of justification. Tim Challies and R. Scott Clark (in his thoughts on Colson’s answer to Challies) take this road. Official teaching is binding on all Roman Catholics. Therefore, because the Protestant position is anathema in the eyes of Rome, there can be no unity, however much we might try to pursue it. The catechism says it all.
Evangelical Christians at the local level can actively pursue unity with Roman Catholics because of the variety of beliefs within the Catholic Church. This seems to be the road that Colson, J.I. Packer, Richard Land, and N.T. Wright are advocating and seeking to represent with their various documents. Regardless of the doctrinal stance pronounced at the Council of Trent, there are many Catholics who believe and can articulate well the doctrine of justification by faith alone. Anathemas aside, some unity (at the grassroots level) can exist and we ought to work for more.

Here are my thoughts on each position.

The first position is untenable to me. Jesus’ prayer for unity in the Body obligates me to see the ecumenical task as important for Christianity. Christians are not given a choice here. Of course, the first position rightly observes the common pitfalls of ecumenism, namely: reducing Christianity to the “lowest common denominator,” compromising Christian essentials on the altar of “false peace,” and acting as if major doctrinal disagreements are really no disagreements at all. Evangelical Christians should heed the warnings of those in Camp #1, even if we don’t wind up in this camp.

Camp #2 also makes good points. If we compare the official teaching of Protestant confessions and Roman Catholic dogma and see these confessions as binding on our ecumenical task, there can be no unity. R. Scott Clark, Tim Challies, and others are right to see that the divide is, at least officially, “unbridgeable” at this point. The Protestant understanding of salvation has been anathematized by the Roman Church. We should not take this lightly.

Yet, I see a mysterious double standard here. Can we share Christian fellowship with our Lutheran brothers and sisters? What about Reformed with Baptist? Presbyterian with Lutheran?

Those in Camp #2 would, no doubt, say “yes.” But consider this:

The Lutheran Book of Concord (1580), a doctrinally normative book of confessions that pastors and church workers must pledge allegiance to, contains the Augsburg Confession. Here, Lutherans strongly “condemn” those who “reject the baptism of children and say that children are saved without baptism.” So much for us Baptists.
The “Epitome of the Formula of Concord” consigns to the “just judgment of God” the Reformed understanding of the Lord’s Supper.
The Scots Confession of Faith from 1560, still authoritative for the Scottish Reformed Church “utterly condemns” those who affirm the sacraments to be “naked and bare signs.”
The Belgic Confession of the Netherlands in 1566 (another Reformed Church) calls down “a solemn curse” on those who “not only have not been content in receiving Baptism once and for all, but who also damn the Baptism of the children from the faithful.” Ouch! Do my Scottish Reformed brothers believe that I, as a Baptist, am under God’s curse?

The gentlemen who make up the panel of the White Horse Inn radio program have confessions in their history that anathematize one another. And yet, there is great unity among the panel.

How is this so? It seems that there is a disconnect between what the confessions say and what people actually believe.

Although a Lutheran believes infant baptism to be correct, most Lutherans today would not agree with the curses from heaven on Baptists. Though a Reformed pastor believes his view of the Lord’s Supper to be true, most Reformed men would not condemn their memorialist brothers and sisters to God’s just judgment.

The people who occupy Camp #2 believe that Roman Catholics and evangelicals can have no unity because of the official teachings of the churches. Yet, most in Camp #2 have no trouble pursuing unity with those within Protestantism, whose churches have officially condemned one another.

This pushes me into Camp #3, although I am somewhat more reserved in my enthusiasm than Colson, Wright, Packer and others. The signers of Evangelicals and Catholics Together tend to overstate the importance of their ecumenical documents, investing them with significance that does not translate into actual change. (I also wonder what sort of true unity comes about by signing joint statements.) I am, however, grateful to these men for taking up the difficult task of trying to bring about unity.

Perhaps evangelicals can also learn from the editors of Touchstone magazine. These are men who hold tightly to their own doctrinal commitments and viewpoints. And yet, their collaboration and ecumenical efforts have resulted in commentary that is highly beneficial to thoughtful, conservative Christians everywhere.

Instead of receiving the scoffing, sarcastic remarks of some in the Reformed blogosphere, the men involved in ECT or Touchstone deserve our respect, even if we may sometimes disagree. We could humbly learn from their example, as well as from their mistakes and oversights.

Can evangelicals and Catholics be together?

It depends on which evangelicals and which Catholics.

One day, God’s Kingdom won’t be divided up into denominations. We should be thankful for those whose ecumenical work is anticipating that Day.

Comments (4)

March 29, 2008

The Peter Enns Controversy

Filed under: Christianity, Theology — Trevin Wax @ 2:30 pm

On March 27, the Board of Trustees at Westminster Theological Seminary announced that professor Peter Enns would be suspended from teaching at the conclusion of this school year.

Those of us who are outside the Westminster circles should be faithful to pray for Dr. Enns, as well as for the faculty and Board at Westminster. Surely this was a painful decision for all involved.

Many people are wondering what the fuss is about. Why has Peter Enns been suspended? What are the controversial issues surrounding his 2005 book, Inspiration and Incarnation? Why has he been criticized?

The point of this post is not to take sides, but to offer a brief summary of the discussion on Enns’ work so far, in order to see what the issues are and why there has been so much controversy.

1. Enns has been criticized for emphasizing the human nature of Scripture over against the divine.
Enns has used the analogy of Christ’s incarnation in order to reflect the nature of Scripture. Just as Christ is fully human and fully divine, so also Scripture is God’s inspired Word to us. Yet it comes to us incarnated in the language, world, and culture of its human authors. Responding to the above criticism, Enns has expressed regret over not emphasizing the divine source of Scripture more in his book, though he maintains that the intention of the book was to shine light on the human side of Scripture, as he believes this aspect to be often neglected in evangelical circles.

2. Enns has written that the first chapters of Genesis are firmly grounded in ancient myth, which he defines as “an ancient, premodern, prescientific way of addressing questions of ultimate origins in the form of stories.”
Critics have been perplexed by Enns’ description of the early Genesis stories because his definition of myth seems to leave no room for actual historical accounts. Enns has expressed regret in not being clearer in his affirmation of the “basic historical referential nature” of the opening of Genesis. Yet Enns has not been clear in affirming just what Genesis tells us about what historical events he believed actually took place.

3. Enns claims that Scripture is inspired and inerrant, however the way he describes Scripture seems to counter that belief.
Enns believes we are wrong to have a preconceived notion of inerrancy into which we must fit the Scriptures. Instead, he believes we should define inerrancy based on Scripture. Enns’ critics claim that he is the one who is allowing extra-biblical sources to define the nature of Scriptural inspiration (for example, by defining the genre of Genesis as “myth” based on the conceptual similarities with other ancient literature).

4. Enns does not seek to harmonize seemingly-contradictory parts of Scripture because he believes the diversity of Scripture is complementary.
Enns appears to affirm that the diverse descriptions of Scripture form a tension within the canon that is God-inspired. God has placed surface “irreconcilable perspectives” in the texts on purpose. Enns’ critics have charged him with overstating the apparent problems in the Old Testament. Enns has expressed regret for not laying out more clearly the fact that there is no error in Scripture. His critics believe he is redefining inerrancy by saying, in effect, that the contradictions (i.e. “errors”) in Scripture are not errant because God placed them there by design.

5. Enns rejects the idea of objective unbiased historiography.
According to Enns, no historical account is a bare statement of facts. All history has an intended purpose and a certain bias. Enns’ critics agree. However, several critics have objected to the idea that bias necessarily negates the truth of the account in question. They worry that Enns’ rejection of objective historiography will communicate a disregard for the truth of historiography.

There are several other points of conflict, but I hesitate to go any deeper right now. I encourage my readers to read Enns’ book and his reviewers and critics for more detailed information. I hope my brief outline of the issues at stake will be a resource for the curious. (Since this is a blog post and not an academic paper, I have not included footnotes and a bibliography. Below are some of the resources from which I have drawn this material.)

Reviews:
Beale and Enns Debate
MYTH, HISTORY, AND INSPIRATION: A REVIEW ARTICLE OF INSPIRATION AND INCARNATION BY PETER ENNS by G.K. Beale
RESPONSE TO G. K. BEALE’S REVIEW ARTICLE OF INSPIRATION AND INCARNATION by Peter Enns
A Surrejoinder to Peter Enn’s Response to G. K. Beale’s JETS Review Article of His Book, Inspiration and Incarnation by G.K. Beale
Brenton C. Ferry’s review
A response by Pete Enns to Ferry’s review
Inspiration and Incarnation: Evangelicals and the Problem of the Old Testament
Enns’ response here.
Three Books on the Bible: A Critical Review (N.T. Wright, John Webster, and Peter Enns) by D.A. Carson
Interview with Peter Enns at Solent Green

April 1 Chapel Message regarding Enns’ dismissal

Comments (36)

March 6, 2008

Guest Post: Why I Am a Christian

Filed under: Christianity — Trevin Wax @ 4:19 am

This post is written by my youngest brother, Weston Wax, a senior in high school who is planning on attending Union University in the Fall. Someone asked him why he was a Christian, prompting him to craft this response. Feel free to leave some comments to encourage him.

I was born a sinner (Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, And in sin my mother conceived me. Psalm 51.5), torn apart from oneness with God (All have sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God. Romans 3:23). Because of the mutiny that took place in the Garden, when Man rejected God as creator and tried to supplant His authority with mans, a wall has been set in place between me and God. The sins that I commit (and we all sin) cannot go unpunished. Because God is a just God, He is held to His responsibility of judging my sin, and sentencing me to death. (For the wages of sin is death. Romans 6:23)

However, because of his love for me, God the father gave me a gift, an alternative, a replacement. This gift is the person of Jesus Christ (For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son, that whosoever believes in him, will not die but have eternal life. John 3:16). God deemed it acceptable that the sacrifice of His own Son would be a just replacement for my own life. Only because his son was blameless and without sin would this sacrifice be sufficient. On the cross, Jesus took my sins upon himself, bearing the full brunt of God’s wrath and justice, and tore down the wall that we built, dividing me from God (But the gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Romans 6:23). Jesus stood in my place, and received the punishment that I deserved.

It is this sacrifice that I feel commanded to surrender to. I have been given a second chance, a hope of reunion with God, and that gift is too good to pass up. I feel it’s my responsibility to glorify God (Whether therefore you eat or drink, do all to the glory of God. 1 Cor. 10:31). I couldn’t truly glorify God while still shackled to my old self: but by relying on the sacrifice of Jesus Christ I am made into a new being (and have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him– Col. 3:10, and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth. Eph 4:24).

Now, I can approach God’s throne confidently, (But now Christ has brought you back to God by dying in his physical body. He did this so that you could come into God’s presence without sin, fault, or blame.Col. 1:22) knowing that Jesus has taken my punishment and my sins are nailed to the cross where I no longer have to feel their weight. I am able to feel no shame for my past and its stains, because Jesus has cleansed those stains and promised to continue to renew my heart daily. I, under this transformed way of life, am now commanded to live purely and blamelessly (like Jesus, our example).

Because of the sin nature that is still in me, it is inevitable that I will continue to sin. However, by simply asking for forgiveness and turning away from that sin, I am forgiven by God and he remembers my sins no more. (If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness 1 John 1:9)

It is the hope of total redemption that gives me a reason to live and breathe. Nothing outside of Jesus Christ gives me this hope. (I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me John 14:6).

Because of His Sacrifice, which demands my surrender, which gives me freedom, which gives me a hope… I am a Christian.

Comments (5)

March 4, 2008

Civic Prayers in Jesus’ Name

Filed under: Christianity, Church Issues, Politics — Trevin Wax @ 4:05 am

Should a pastor pray in Jesus’ name at a civic event?

Mark Roberts says “yes,” although he believes praying in Jesus’ name does not necessarily mean one will use that phrase at the end of a prayer. Mark goes on to explain his own practice of praying at civic events and his reasoning for not including the name of Christ.

When I have prayed in public, secular gatherings, I have not said “in Jesus’ name” because I knew that many of the people whom I was leading in prayer were not Christians. My goal was to include through my words as many people in the prayer as possible. I wanted all who had gathered to be able to pray with me, to join me in the “Amen” without hesitation. I didn’t want to leave some people out if I could help it.

I respectfully disagree with Mark’s practice. (And I do mean “respectfully.” I enjoy Mark’s blog and have benefited from his scholarship. It is difficult to judge a person’s “tone” when blogging, so let me say at the outset that my disagreement is intented to be expressed in brotherly love and with admiration for Mark’s ministry.)

First off, let me state my agreement with Mark’s belief that praying “in Jesus’ name” is more than a magic phrase we attach to the end of our prayers. Yes, praying in Jesus’ name means praying under his authority and according to his will. Mark is right to point out the danger of letting the words “in Jesus’ name” become a mere tagline at the end of our prayers, intended to bless whatever we’ve requested.

But I have trouble with Mark’s reasoning when it comes to civic gatherings. As stated above, Mark wants to make sure that he can include as many people in the prayer as possible. Though he writes that his public prayers are brief and are addressed to God (not to the people in the audience), he still exhibits a curious preoccupation with his audience if he is willing to forego the mention of Jesus’ name in an attempt to be inclusive.

What bothers me most about Mark’s explanation is his willingness to praying distinctly Christian prayers at interfaith funerals, where “representatives of different faith traditions pray ways that are consistent with their own religious convictions.” In other words, when there are more faiths represented and each minister is expected to pray accordingly, Mark does so.

Mark’s post on this subject reminds me of a conversation I once had with an Eastern Orthodox priest in Louisville. We were talking theology over coffee one morning when the priest recounted a similar experience. He had been invited to pray at a civic gathering, but the organizer had instructed him to not pray anything “distinctly Christian” and to avoid mention of Jesus’ name.

The priest asked the organizer, “What kind of prayer do you want me to pray?”

The man replied, “Something generic.”

The priest answered back. “Then you’ll have to find someone else. I’m not a ‘generic priest.’ I am an Orthodox priest and if you invite me to your function, I will pray as a Christian.”

The organizer of the event backed down and my friend was able to pray as he wished.

I admire Mark’s sensitivity in not wanting to be divisive. Certainly we should avoid “preaching” in our public prayers. It is counterintuitive for a tone-deaf Christian minister to try and ram Christian doctrine down people’s throats during a civic ceremony.

But Jesus is divisive. Mark hopes that as many people as possible will be able to say “Amen” at the end of his prayers. But if the people in his audience are not believers in Christ, their “Amens” and their prayers are in vain. What kind of agreement do we have in our prayers with unbelievers if we are not agreed on the identity of God – the One who has revealed himself in the person of Jesus Christ?

Furthermore, the fact that Mark prays in Jesus’ name at interfaith services simply compounds my initial unease with his proposal. The idea that the mention of Jesus is less offensive when offered alongside prayers from Muslim, Jewish, or Hindu religious leaders simply reinforces the pluralistic, secularized assumptions of our culture that all religions are equal and valid.

I am not questioning Mark’s sincerity or his fervent faith in Christ. I am questioning the prevailing assumption in our culture that would have us celebrate our faith openly as long as we are celebrating other faiths at the same time or would have us mute our specific beliefs whenever the secular realm demands “generalities.”

When I am invited to pray at public events, I do so graciously. But I consciously tweak the last phrase of my prayers from “through Jesus Christ our Lord” to “through Jesus Christ the Lord.” That way, I have declared the lordship of Christ openly and publicly, without giving false hope to those who are not living under his reign. I feel it is the only honest way for me to pray at civic gatherings. So far I have not heard any complaints. But if someone asks that I pray more “generically,” I will follow the example of my Orthodox friend and suggest they find a “generic” minister.

Comments (2)

February 14, 2008

N.T. Wright Responds to Archbishop’s Stance on “Sharia Law”

Filed under: Christianity, World News — Trevin Wax @ 4:26 am

The full text of Wright’s response can be found here. Here are some highlights:

On the Media Frenzy

The astonishing misrepresentation of Archbishop Rowan in virtually all newspapers over the last few days, and the scorn and anger which this has fuelled, have caused many people within the church to ask what on earth is going on. The issues are complex, but let me try to highlight the key points. Obviously it would be good for people to read the whole lecture, which is available on line at his website together with further clarification.

On Christianity as a Comprehensive Worldview that Stands Against Secularism

For 200 years it has been assumed that these operated in separate spheres: the law regulates my public life, faith or religion operate in private. This was always a dangerous half-truth, since many of the great world faiths, including Christianity itself, actually claim that all of life is included within religious obedience. As some of us used to be taught, if Jesus is not Lord of all, he is not Lord at all. In recent years various governments, including our own, have pushed the other way, to suggest that the secular state is itself master of all of life, including religious conviction. That’s why we’ve seen an airline worker sacked for wearing a cross, while in France the government has tried similarly to ban Muslim women from wearing their traditional head-covering. Because we haven’t had to address these issues before, our society has tended to slide round them by emphasizing words like ‘multiculturalism’, which often doesn’t actually mean that we celebrate our different cultures but rather that we subordinate them all to whatever the secular state wants. That is as much a problem for Catholic adoption agencies, as we saw last year, as it is for Muslims who want to follow their traditional teaching about (for instance) the prohibition of interest on loans while living within a society where the mortgage system is endemic. +Rowan was going to the roots of these problems and coming up not only with fresh analysis but fresh solutions, particularly what he calls ‘interactive pluralism’. The question of how we live together as a civil and wise society while cherishing different faiths is a deep and serious one and can’t be pushed away just because people take fright at certain misunderstandings. His point was precisely that neither the secular state nor any particular religion can ‘monopolise’.

On What the Controversy Teaches Us

What the whole sorry affair highlights is that our society is extremely touchy not only about Islam (and not only because of terrorism), but also about the whole, normally unspoken, set of assumptions about society, law, culture, freedom and religion by which we have operated. We live at a time of massive cultural change, and we shouldn’t be surprised that attempts to understand what’s going on and do something about it are deeply threatening. This is somewhat like what happens when a couple are having their first session with a marriage guidance counsellor after years of unspoken puzzlement, and find some of the questions threatening. But unless we can ask the difficult questions, and try to address them wisely and maturely, we will drift into worse problems by far.

Comments (1)

January 28, 2008

Joel Osteen’s Negative Message

Filed under: Christianity — Trevin Wax @ 1:55 pm

Everywhere you turn nowadays, there’s Joel Osteen!

He’s on the cable news channels, pontificating about the political process, Mormonism and how “God is the judge of the heart.”

He’s on the bookshelves, smiling from the covers of Your Best Life Now and Become a Better You, promising new life and hope to the downtrodden.

He’s on TV, trumpeting his feel-good gospel of positive reinforcement to a watching world.

Osteen has legions of followers, but he has garnered a large group of critics too. Where is God in his message? What about sin? What about grace? What about Jesus?

Osteen answers his critics in the following way: I focus on the positive. Sin and punishment and all that isn’t my message. I want to help people and don’t want to beat them down all the time.

By answering his critics this way, Osteen has painted his critics as a bunch of denigrating, pulpit-pounding, sin-obsessed pastors. He wants to focus on “the positive.”

But does Osteen do this? I’m afraid not. I’ve listened to Joel Osteen’s messages. I believe he sincerely wants to help people who feel beaten down by life and who feel guilty for their failures and mistakes. The “positive” message he proclaims is this: Do better. Try harder. Believe you can succeed. In other words, you can change! Just do it! God will help you, of course, but you have to make it happen.

Though Osteen claims he has positive sermons, I believe he is proclaiming the most negative, unmerciful message possible! Like telling a clinically depressed person to “just snap out of it!,” Osteen is giving people burdened by sin, guilt and despair more reason to despair.

Do we really think that more willpower will solve our problems? What is this message but the Law on steroids? There is no gospel in Osteen’s message, regardless of his rare references to Jesus Christ. Osteen’s idea of “good news” is telling self-centered people to look for salvation in more narcissism! Osteen’s preaching is like giving sugar to a diabetic, telling people that the magic medicine will help them, when in fact, it is speeding up their death.

What galls me most about Joel Osteen is that he claims the evangelical label! What have we come to? Osteen’s acceptance of Mitt Romney as a brother in Christ because “he says he has a personal relationship with Jesus” is the same logic some evangelicals apply to Osteen. Nevermind that he implicitly denies the reason for Jesus’ death, the sin we need salvation from, and the only lasting solution that will bring life transformation. Joel says he has a relationship with Jesus. So that’s good enough for us?

Don’t be fooled by the smiling man on the book cover. Joel Osteen’s message is not positive at all.

Comments (55)

January 17, 2008

Why We Are Pro-Life

Filed under: Christianity, Church Issues, Politics, Theology — Trevin Wax @ 3:22 am

Every January, Southern Baptists mark the sad anniversary of Roe vs. Wade by celebrating the sanctity, or sacredness or human life. Instead of mourning the American “culture of death,” we look hopefully to the future and celebrate the God who cherishes his creation.

Scripture often refers to God as the God of the fatherless and the widow. “God executes justice for the fatherless and the widow” (Deut. 10:18). ”Father of the fatherless and protector of widows is God in his holy habitation” (Ps. 68:5).

In Bible times, as in many places in our world even today, widows and orphans were the most vulnerable people in society. They were people without a voice. To be orphaned was to be abandoned. To be a widow with no immediate family members was to be impoverished.

But God declares that He is the Father of the fatherless and the protector of widows. He is the God of the oppressed. He is the one who hears the cries of those who have no voice. And that is why we, as Christians, are pro-life. We are pro-life, because our God is pro-life.

We believe human beings have a right to live – because of who they are – as image bearers of God – not because of what they do – as productive members of society. We do not judge the worth of a person by their usefulness to society. But sadly, our culture is beginning to do just that.

Human embryos are disposable – maybe useful for future medical research. And thus an embryo’s value is found it what it can be used for, not in what it is.

The unborn have no voice. They cannot yet think or reason, so their rights depend on the circumstances of the mother. They have value only if they are “wanted,” and they can be terminated if they are “unwanted.”

The senior citizen battling dementia – what useful purpose does she serve for society? Why not allow her to die? After all, euthanasia provides “death with dignity.” Society thinks the elderly have no value in who they are, as fellow human beings who bear the image of God, but in what they can do to serve society.

We must fight against our society’s mindset with the most powerful weapon in the Christian arsenal – compassion. We must make it clear that the reason we prize human life is because God prizes human life – at all stages.
      The human life of an embryo in a science lab
      The human life of an unborn baby in development
      The human life of an expectant mother faced with a crisis
      The human life of a mentally handicapped child
      The human life of a man in a vegetative state
      The human life of an elderly woman in a nursing home

Our approach to abortion is the compassionate one. We stand up for those who have no choice, those who have no voice. Through the work of pregnancy support centers, we walk alongside hurting mothers, helping them through pregnancy after they decide to preserve their baby’s life. We are there to counsel the other women who feel the enormous burden of guilt after having taken their child’s life.

Our approach to the elderly is the same. We do not agree with the term “death with dignity,” because no death is ever dignified. Death is a mar on God’s good creation. It is our greatest enemy.

But our Savior – the one who raised the widow’s son, congratulated the poor, raised up the oppressed and gave voice to the voiceless – He himself defeated death on Easter morning, unleashing God’s new creation into our world.

And that is why we are pro-life. In God’s eyes, every human life is precious. Every human being bears his fingerprints. Every person – from the embryo to the elderly – deserves life.

May God give us the courage to show the love of the Father to the fatherless.

Comments (9)

January 2, 2008

Book Review: Pagan Christianity

Filed under: Book Reviews, Christianity — Trevin Wax @ 4:51 am

Pagan Christianity by Frank Viola and George Barna (Barna Books, 2008) is sure to ruffle some feathers. In the authors’ attempt to “explore the roots of our church practices,” they aim their guns at nearly every aspect of the institutional church.

Books that critique the current worship practices of the Church come and go. But rarely does one come across a book that so vehemently opposes everything about the institutional Church. Viola and Barna are convinced that the housechurch/organic church movement is the way of the future because it is the only authentic reproduction of the past.

Viola and Barna believe that for almost 2000 years, the Church has been seriously misguided. Layers of tradition have stifled the true Christian experience. In order to recover the early church of the apostles, we must see the church as an “organic entity.”

An organic church is simply a church that is born out of spiritual life instead of constructed by human institutions and held together by religious programs. Organic churches are characterized by Spirit-led, open-participatory meetings and nonhierarchical leadership. This is in stark contrast to a clergy-led institution-driven church.

Pagan Christianity takes the readers through the history of many of our church practices. The authors argue the following:

The church should not contain any hierarchy at all.
The senior pastor is actually an obstacle to the fully-functioning body of Christ.
The idea of a sermon in a church gathering is pagan (after all, that brings about a clergy/laity distinction).
Church buildings take away from the biblical teaching that the Church is a people.
Any routine in worship is wrong. All liturgy, whether Protestant, Catholic or free church is misguided and stifling to the Holy Spirit.
Dressing up for church is a leftover from paganism and hypocritical for Christians.
No one should lead in singing. To have a worship leader picking songs is an affront to freedom in Christ.
Tithing is completely unbiblical and now serves to prop up the unbiblical institutionalized church and the salaries of unbiblical clergy.
Baptism and the Lord’s Supper have been coopted by pagan mysticism.
Christian education doesn’t work because everything is mind-focused. Discipleship should be an apprentice-ship, not just filling the head with information.
The Bible needs to be read in context, not as a jigsaw puzzle.
We need to be like Jesus – revolutionaries who are ready to turn aside all tradition.

A few areas of agreement (and I do mean a few):

It’s good to question why we do things a certain way in worship. I do not find fault with the authors for posing good questions.
We do need to recover the celebratory aspect of the Lord’s Supper, and I think that placing the Supper within the context of a community meal might help.
The Bible does, indeed, need to be read as a narrative, and not merely as a list of selective verses.
We need to be willing to throw out traditions that are unbiblical.

Some areas of disagreement:

1. First off, I disagree with the underlying premise of the entire book – a premise that says the early church was untainted and uncorrupted by human tradition. I often ask this question to those who want to get back to the early church: Which early church do you want to be like?

Corinth? (Do you really want incestuous church members and no-rules-at-all worship gatherings?)

Galatia? (Is it good to model a church that has so quickly abandoned the gospel?)

Thessalonica? (Do you want to be the church that has lost the eschatological hope of the new heavens and new earth? A church drowning in grief?)

Sure, we can learn from the earliest churches. But I disagree that there is some pristine, uncorrupted, untainted early church that we must aspire to be.

2. I dislike the way Viola and Barna put forward their argument. They leave no room for discussion on the issue. If you disagree with them, you must love the traditions of man more than God. It becomes impossible to enter into honest dialogue because of the way they have set up the predicament.

3. Pagan Christianity is a historical book that hates history. That might sound like an oxymoron; after all, the book is filled with historical dates and references. But the authors are convinced that all Christianity from the second-century on has been wrong, unbiblical, and harmful to the gospel. In other words, church history is the story of a church that does not at all resemble what Jesus intended.

Let me give a quick example. When discussing the liturgy, the authors seek to show how the order of worship of medieval Catholicism is still visible in Protestant churches. There should be no order of worship, no routine, no liturgy whatsoever. The authors compare and contrast the liturgies of varying denominations to show how they are all unbiblical. But nowhere do the authors entertain the notion that perhaps the similarities in liturgy point to the value in structuring our worship a certain way. Have the greatest thinkers of the past 2000 years been blinded by tradition? Or have the great Christian thinkers seen value in the way Christian worship has developed?

4. Pagan Christianity will drive more evangelicals to the Roman Catholic Church. Just watching an author like George Barna go from one fad to another in the past twenty years is enough to exhaust anyone who tires of the evangelical merry-go-round. Even though Pagan Christianity condemns Roman Catholic tradition, its equating of Roman Catholicism with Protestantism in areas of church practice will undermine this book’s argument. Many disenchanted evangelicals will try out the “organic” churches that Barna recommends, only to discover the same fallenness in this expression of the “church” that they saw in the institutional church they left. Burned, confused, and disappointed, many will turn to Rome for the stability they long for.

5. Pagan Christianity will give ammunition to those who already dislike the churches they have encountered. I do not believe the book will launch a new organic-church movement. I believe the book will give justification to those who have already removed themselves from their local bodies of Christ. Pagan Christianity, if taken seriously by many Christians, will not lead to a renewal of the church, but to ecclesial amputation – as more and more disenchanted church members abandon their church families in order to seek after the “pure church” of the first century. They will keep chasing the pot at the end of the rainbow, only to find it eludes them because it doesn’t exist.

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December 22, 2007

Christmas Quotes

Filed under: Christianity, Quotes of the Week — Trevin Wax @ 3:59 am

He became what we are that he might make us what he is.
Athanasius

God became man to turn creatures into sons: not simply to produce better men of the old kind but to produce a new kind of man.
C.S. Lewis

The mystery of Christ, that He sunk Himself into our flesh, is beyond all human understanding.
Martin Luther

The Son of God became a man to enable men to become sons of God.
C.S. Lewis

Nowhere is salvation conceived of as a flight from history as in Greek thought; it is always the coming of God to man in history. Man does not ascend to God; God descends to man.
George Eldon Ladd

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December 12, 2007

So You Want to Know Early Church History?

Filed under: Book Reviews, Christianity — Trevin Wax @ 5:05 am

Here are some books that were required for my Church History 1 class at Southern Seminary.

If you’re looking for good resources about the early church, I highly recommend them to you – especially The Story of Christianity by Justo L. Gonzalez for its readability and A Concise History of Christian Thought by Tony Lane for its easy-to-digest summaries of the important Christian thinkers throughout history.

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November 27, 2007

How Much Should a Christian Tip?

Filed under: Christianity, Culture / Entertainment — Trevin Wax @ 4:21 am

Christians should astound the world with generosity. To whom much has given, much is required. What is more precious to us than the grace we have received through Jesus Christ? God’s grace should overflow even from our pocketbooks.

It is shameful that many restaurant servers cringe at the thought of working for the “Christians” on Sundays. What do they expect on Sundays? Demanding customers. Lousy tips. The infamous tract that looks like a $20 bill. Self-righteous snobbery. (Believe me; I used to work at a Cracker Barrel.)

So, let’s turn that around. Let’s astound people with generosity.

Why leave a 15% tip for good service? Let’s go above and beyond and give 20% to a good server. After all, why should Christians settle for “average” tipping?

So, here’s a key to Christian tipping:

Servers at a sit-down restaurant: 20%
Take-out meals at a sit-down restaurant: 15%
Yes, I know that many don’t tip for take-out meals, but just remember this: the server who put all your food together in packets and set it all up for you is probably making $2.15 an hour.
Pizza Delivery Man: 20% (or a $2.00 minimum)
They use their own cars. Plus, they make their money off tips. So don’t be cheap with them!
Take-out Pizza or Drive-Thru Fast Food: 0%.
No tip is expected for picking up a pizza, going to McDonald’s, etc.
Hair Stylist: 20%
Drive-In’s (like Sonic): 20%
Restaurants with a Tip Jar on the Counter: 15%
Starbucks and Other Coffee Houses: 10-15%
Buffets: 15%

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November 26, 2007

Yes, Good People Go To Heaven – But What Does “Good” Mean?

Filed under: Christianity, Church Issues, Inclusivism, Theology — Trevin Wax @ 5:13 am

We’ve been looking at evangelical “inclusivism.” This is the final post in this series.
1. “What is Inclusivism and Why Does It Matter?”
2. “Is God Really Fair?”
3. “What is Faith Anyway?”

Evangelical inclusivists capitulate to culture a third way – by assuming the culture’s high view of human goodness. Pinnock and other inclusivists claim “caution” in their assessment of other religions. They recognize that other religions have “depths of darkness, deception, and bondage in them.”

But though inclusivists seek to be cautious in regards to other religions, they appear much too enthusiastic. Pinnock openly praises Mohammed as a “prophet figure in the style of the Old Testament,” respects Buddha as “a righteous man,” celebrates Hindu literature that articulates a “personal God of love,” and gushes over the “grace” he sees in a Japanese cult! Christianity is unique in that it fulfills, not only the Old Testament religion, but “all religious aspiration and… the human quest itself.”

In Pinnock’s view, all humans are on a quest for the divine. Though he would probably deny the charge, his works indicate that humans are basically good people who simply have gone astray. The people who go to hell will choose to go there because they have consciously chosen to reject Christ. In an interesting twist, Pinnock turns upside-down the traditional teaching that people are bound for hell unless they choose Christ and his heaven and instead teaches a doctrine implying that people are bound for heaven unless they reject Christ and choose hell.

Inclusivists assume that the only sin that people go to hell for is a rejection of salvation in Jesus Christ. Ronald Nash offers a helpful reminder that “rejecting Jesus is not the only reason that men and women are lost. There are no innocent human beings.”

Inclusivism capitulates to the culture’s high view of human morality. Pinnock and others continually point to the goodness and saintliness of the adherents of other religions.

But this brings up a question: who determines what is good? By failing to answer this question, Pinnock and the other inclusivists simply adopt the world’s standard of “goodness” and apply it uncritically to the people around them. It is true that a good Buddhist, a good Muslim and a good Hindu will all go to heaven – if by “good” we mean what Scripture teaches (absolute moral perfection). The problem is not that good people do not go to heaven. Scripture teaches that the problem is there are no good people.

By claiming that saintliness is something other than a consequence of reconciliation with God on the terms he himself has stipulated, the inclusivists divorce “goodness” from the character of Jesus and thus advocate a doctrine of human innocence that is sub-biblical. Pinnock and other inclusivists affirm their position by appealing to God’s overflowing love. But others may ask: “Why should God’s love rather than his truth or holiness ‘overflow’ in the way suggested?” The subordination of God’s holiness to his love is one of the key points of inclusivism’s capitulation to the culture’s view of God.

Inclusivism seeks to answer many of the difficult questions raised by the traditional exclusivist position regarding the fate of the unevangelized. These posts have sought to show how inclusivism’s responses are unbiblical and represent a capitulation to certain cultural assumptions, including the culture’s view of “fairness,” the culture’s definition of “faith,” and the culture’s high view of human goodness.

Though it may be necessary to engage in debate with our inclusivist brothers and sisters, exclusivists should not allow such debates to replace the evangelistic calling of the Church. Though Scripture seems to offer no hope for the unevangelized, wise exclusivists will refrain from dogmatic declarations regarding the extent of God’s salvation.

Christians should participate in missions and evangelism with the belief that Scripture teaches universal human guilt and culpability. We evangelize, not only to improve the lives of those here on earth, but to announce the rescue for those headed for destruction in the life to come.

As for the question as to whether or not God can or will save any unevangelized persons apart from explicit faith in Christ, exclusivists would do well to follow the example of John Calvin and others, who have discouraged speculation into God’s hidden ways. Christians trust in the justice and mercy of a loving, holy God. Ultimately, both the evangelized and unevangelized are in his hands.

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November 23, 2007

Inclusivism: What is “Faith” Anyway?

Filed under: Christianity, Church Issues, Inclusivism, Theology — Trevin Wax @ 8:15 am

A second way in which inclusivism capitulates to the current culture is in the position’s unbiblical descriptions of “saving faith.” Today’s world tends to see “faith” as a purely subjective emotion, divorced from objective content and made efficacious by the intensity with which a person exercises belief. Inclusivists tend to see “faith” in the same way as the culture, preferring subjectivity and thereby implicitly denying the importance of faith’s objective content.

Pinnock affirms that “God really cares about faith and not theology, trust and not orthodoxy.” He also upholds what he calls the “faith principle.” The “faith principle” teaches that salvation comes from satisfying the conditions of Hebrews 11:6. Faith as trust saves, not knowledge. Pinnock says, “According to the Bible, people are saved by faith, not by the content of their theology,” and then adds, “The Bible does not teach that one must confess the name of Jesus to be saved.” The inclusivist downplaying of doctrine and theology virtually empties “faith” of all its objective content. What is important is trust in whatever god or whatever light has been given, not a correct understanding of God revealed in Jesus Christ.

Pinnock’s proposal runs into problems once one grapples with the fact that historical Christianity affirms a very clear understanding of the identity of “God.” Pinnock naively celebrates the similarities between Christianity and other religions without noting that the very nature of “God” is radically different in the religions he gushes over.

Alister McGrath agrees with Pinnock that cognitive knowledge alone is not regarded as salvific. But McGrath helpfully points out that Christianity’s understanding of God is particular and cannot be harmonized with the notions of “divinity” in other religions.

McGrath affirms that even the notion of “salvation” itself differs considerably from one religion to another. He also exposes the naïve way in which Pinnock uses terms that mean quite different things to different people. The object of faith is indeed important, not just the presence of a generic faith that expresses itself in sincerity alone.

Ronald Nash holds in balance the two necessary aspects of saving faith. First, saving faith must be directed to the right object. Faith that is defined exclusively in subjective terms of generic “trust” and vague “dependence” will lead future generations to the doorstep of Schleiermacher and introduce us to a rerun of classical liberalism.

Secondly, Nash claims that “the proper object of faith must be approached with… sincerity and genuine commitment.” Evangelicals do not affirm a mere “mental assent” to certain key doctrines as salvific. Biblical faith finds its expression in both the objective content of the Christian gospel (the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ) and the subjective feelings that indicate true heart transformation (trust and sincerity).

Missiologist David Hesselgrave wisely warns against pitting the subjective and objective aspects of faith against each other. “Like hydrogen and oxygen in water, they go together.” The downplaying of creedal faith is one of the characteristics of the current culture. Inclusivism too quickly adopts the cultural definition of “faith” as sincerity and then promotes a “saving faith” that is a generic trust in whatever spiritual light may be available.

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November 21, 2007

Inclusivism: Is God Really Fair?

Filed under: Christianity, Church Issues, Inclusivism, Theology — Trevin Wax @ 4:00 am

Inclusivism represents a capitulation to the current cultural climate first by its adoption of Western individualistic notions of “fairness” and then its subsequent contention that God’s actions should necessarily correspond to these notions. The inclusivist argument begins with an emotional appeal to humanity’s innate sense of “fairness.” Even the much-revered C.S. Lewis (though more agnostic about the fate of the unevangelized than a self-professing inclusivist) succumbed to the temptation of judging God according to human standards of fairness.

“Is it not frightfully unfair that this new life should be confined to people who have heard of Christ and been able to believe in Him? But the truth is God has not told us what his arrangements about the other people are. We do know that no man can be saved except through Christ; we do not know that only those who know Him can be saved through Him.”

Clark Pinnock takes Lewis’ notion to the next level by seeking to prove that salvation must be available to all human beings. “If God really loves the whole world and desires everyone to be saved, it follows logically that everyone must have access to salvation.” For Pinnock and other inclusivists, it is “unfair” for some to have access to God’s salvation while others perish without ever hearing the gospel. Therefore, salvation must either be accessible through general revelation (the created order) or through a post-mortem opportunity for decision.

Pinnock’s inclusivism is difficult to defend because of his “open theist” view of God. According to Pinnock’s version of open theism, God cannot and does not know the future decisions of the free creatures he has made since his foreknowledge would necessarily impinge upon human free will. But it is here that Pinnock’s open theism contradicts his inclusivism. How can Pinnock so forcefully announce that God will offer the news of his salvation to every unevangelized person in the world? If God does not know the future, God himself does not know if this feat can be accomplished, much less Pinnock.

Furthermore, Pinnock’s view is driven by his notion of fairness, one that depends heavily upon the American ethos of individualism, free choice, and equal opportunity. For Pinnock, it is unthinkable that a loving God would present some with the opportunity to accept or reject his salvation, but not others. This picture of God conflicts with Pinnock’s Western notions of fairness and equality. Therefore, Pinnock brings in the universality axiom: God’s salvation must be accessible to every human being regardless of their knowledge of Jesus Christ.

Though the inclusivist position may seem attractive on the surface, it falls apart under the weight of its own appeal to fairness. For this essay’s present purposes, let us concede for a moment the inclusivist statement that God’s salvation is accessible to every human being. Even if this affirmation were true, a question begs to be asked: is salvation accessible to every human being equally?

Consider a Buddhist child growing up in the United States in a Buddhist family that has emigrated from a Buddhist country. The Buddhist family moves next door to a Baptist family. The Baptist child places her faith in Christ, as God uses the testimony of a godly heritage and a nurturing church to bring her to faith. The Buddhist child hears the gospel, but the cultural and familial pressures of Buddhism prove too great for her, and she rejects Christianity and remains a Buddhist. Both children heard the gospel. Salvation was accessible to both, and yet the inclusivist charge of “unfairness” can still again be leveled against God because salvation was not equally accessible. According to the inclusivist position, the Buddhist child will be punished after death for her rejection of the gospel. Yet considering the circumstances that God in his sovereignty placed her in, it is difficult to imagine her doing otherwise (apart from the Holy Spirit’s power of conviction). The inclusivist position does not “justify” God’s fairness; it only exacerbates the problem.

Other similar charges can be leveled “against” God’s fairness. Is it not unfair that a person who lives sixty years may have more opportunities to hear the gospel than the person who dies in a car accident at the age of thirty? Is it not unfair that the child who is born to hypocritical Christian parents rejects the Christian faith while the child born into a warm, authentic Christian family places saving faith in Christ?

The inclusivist position fails to show how the accessibility of salvation resolves the issue of “fairness.” In fact, inclusivism fails to show how God must be held accountable to this notion of fairness in the first place. Carl Henry gives us a healthy reminder.

“To accuse God of misconduct, to fault him and disparage his electing grace, is to forget that God himself is the standard of truth and justice and love. Scripture nowhere derives its doctrine of truth, justice, and love from heathen sources. The perversion of truth, justice, and love is what makes humans heathen. God’s fairness is demonstrated because he condemns sinners not in the absence of light but because of their rebellious response. His mercy is demonstrated because he provides fallen humans with a privileged call to redemption not extended to fallen angels. He continues to extend that call worldwide even while some rebel humans spurn it as unloving and unjust and prefer to die in their sins. All are judged by what they do with the light they have, and none is without light.”

Later, we’ll look at inclusivism’s capitulation to culture by adopting world’s definition of “faith.”

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November 20, 2007

What is Inclusivism and Why Does It Matter?

Filed under: Christianity, Church Issues, Inclusivism, Theology — Trevin Wax @ 3:49 am

Not a week goes by that someone in their 20’s or 30’s asks me the perennial question: “Is Jesus the only way to God?” I believe that the question of Jesus as the only way to God is the defining question for our generation.

America has quickly become a pluralist society. The number of religious options for American citizens has grown considerably in the past two hundred years, and immigration ensures that this trend will continue in the future. Often tethered to American pluralism is a philosophical pluralism that relativizes all religious truth claims and fights vehemently against any religious “monopoly” on truth.

Though evangelicals have largely avoided the philosophical pluralism that plagues the mainline denominations, several prominent evangelical scholars have begun espousing a “middle way” between the exclusivist claims of traditional Christianity and the relativistic doctrines of today’s pluralism. Over the next few days, I will seek to define this evangelical “inclusivism” and then show how evangelical inclusivism represents a capitulation to the current culture by adopting Western individualistic notions of “fairness,” by emptying saving faith of its biblical content, and by sharing the culture’s high view of human goodness.

Defining Inclusivism

In evangelicalism, no monolithic movement of “inclusivists” exists. Each inclusivist scholar will define and describe the inclusivist position with different nuances.

Yet, most inclusivists will agree with the basic points of Clark Pinnock’s proposal. Pinnock is a leading proponent of evangelical inclusivism who believes that Christians should take seriously the doctrine of God’s omnipresence. God’s presence in the whole world indicates that God’s grace is also at work “in some way” among all peoples.

The inclusivist position rests upon two axioms: particularity and universality. Regarding particularity, inclusivism differs from pluralism by stating clearly that salvation is found only through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Regarding universality, inclusivism differs from exclusivism by claiming that God intends his salvation to be available to all humans everywhere. These two axioms lead Pinnock and other inclusivists to “entertain the possibility that religion may play a role in the salvation of the human race, a role preparatory to the gospel of Christ, in whom alone fullness of salvation is found.”

Inclusivists join with exclusivists in proclaiming that God’s salvation is always grounded on the person of Jesus Christ and the work he has accomplished for human redemption. Inclusivists also stand with exclusivists against universalism (the belief that all human beings will be saved) due to the frequent biblical references to hell and punishment.

But inclusivists are quick to agree with pluralists that God’s salvation must not be and cannot be restricted to only those who hear the gospel and consciously put their faith in Christ. After all, the practical implications of such a restriction would necessarily mean that the vast majority of human beings who have lived never even had an opportunity to believe in Christ and are therefore doomed to hell.

Though inclusivists claim to offer a “middle way” between pluralism and exclusivism, John Hick, a well-known pluralist who rejects Christ’s divinity, the inspiration of the Bible and other essential Christian doctrines, claims that “Pinnock’s inclusivism represents an enormous advance on Christian exclusivism.” Hick’s enthusiasm for the inclusivist position indicates the proximity of the inclusivist and pluralist views. Exclusivists tend to be much more reserved in their appreciation of evangelical inclusivism.

The inclusivist affirmation of salvation for people apart from conscious faith in Christ is what separates the inclusivists from exclusivism and this crucial difference will be the main focus of the remaining posts in this series. Stay tuned.

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November 15, 2007

Only Human?

Filed under: Christianity, Theology — Trevin Wax @ 3:20 am

We’ve all used the phrase at some time: “I’m only human.” We usually use it to slither out of a rather uncomfortable situation when we’re left no other choice but to admit that we did something deplorable. Understanding we are without excuse and have no defense, we sputter out that beloved phrase that’s supposed to bring us immunity to the charges brought against us: “Nobody’s perfect. I’m only human.”

Since I have used this phrase, too, let me rain on our little parade. The “only human” argument is not only unbiblical and untrue, it actually argues for the opposite point of view we’re trying to prove.

How do I know this? Let’s head back to Genesis 1 – the place we must begin, since it’s where we find our own beginning. As the crowning achievement of His glorious creation, God creates man and woman in His image – charging them to take care of the earth and animals and to be fruitful and multiply. As God sat back at the end of that sixth day, “He saw everything that He had made, and behold, it was very good.”

Here we see God’s original intention for humanity – a good design for a good creation. No sin, no pain, no problems. That is of course before the disastrous turn of events in chapter 3, when man turns his back on the Creator and finds himself in the middle of a world gone-wrong.

From that moment on, humans have been on the road to destruction, refusing to worship or honor the God whose image they bear. Keeping in mind God’s original intent for humanity, we can see how humans have become “less than human” through their actions, attitudes and self-centered pride. Our “foolish hearts are darkened” and we have “exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man.”

Fast forward a few thousand of years to the birth of the Second Adam. God sent His Son, Jesus Christ (fully human and fully divine) to redeem the world from sin, showing us what it means to be truly human. Those who believe the Gospel message are transformed into a “new creation,” and thus live out a “renewed humanity.”

Here is where I want to center our attention. Instead of claiming we are “only human” when we do wrong, we should remember that our human nature may indeed be sinful, but human nature, in its essence and as originally created by God, is perfect and complete. This silences that old debate about whether or not Jesus could have been fully human without ever committing a sin. Some believe that sinning is so intertwined with the essence of human existence that one cannot avoid sin and still be human. Obviously, Jesus did, so the whole argument is faulty.

Let me ask the hard question. Was Jesus’ humanity (sinless and perfect) the same as our humanity? If you say no, you’re on shaky theological ground, because you are admitting that to be human means to be tempted and to sin. If you say yes, you are recognizing my point. Sin is not an essential part of human nature, the way it was created by God. Yes, we are fallen creatures. We are born in sin and without Christ’s sacrifice, we die in sin. But humanity, in its essence, was not sinful. “God saw that it was good!”

So the question changes. Instead of judging Christ’s humanity by ours, we should start analyzing our humanity by His. “Was Jesus really as human as us if He didn’t sin?” is the wrong question. Better put – “Are we as human as Jesus?” The answer is clear: no! Jesus is not less human for not sinning. He is more human! He fulfills the original intention that God had for the crown of His creation. Jesus (just like Adam and Eve before they sinned) experienced humanity in its original purity – in its God-intended form.

That’s why “I’m only human” makes no sense for the Christian. Christ has set us free from the chains of sin and death and has showed us how to live like renewed humanity, “transformed by the renewing of our minds.” As we become more and more like Christ, the image of God we bear becomes more and more pronounced. We leave behind the addictions, perversions, and ambitions that make us “less human,” less than what God originally created us to be.

Then, through the Holy Spirit’s power, we grow in our renewed state, striving for the day when God will complete the work He began in us – when our humanity will be sin-free and renewed through and through. So, next time you find yourself caught in a “less than human” act of sin, say the same phrase as a Christian, this time with a different meaning. “I’m only human! That’s why I have no excuse.”

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November 7, 2007

Book Review: Understanding 4 Views on the Lord’s Supper

Filed under: Book Reviews, Christianity, Church Issues, Lord's Supper, Reformed Theology, Roman Catholicism, Southern Baptist Convention, Theology — Trevin Wax @ 3:19 am

I’m a big fan of Zondervan’s Counterpoints series. I enjoy reading different perspectives on any number of doctrines. I eagerly awaited the Counterpoints contribution to the Lord’s Supper, and I was not disappointed.

Understanding Four Views on the Lord’s Supper lays out the Baptist, Reformed, Lutheran, and Roman Catholic views of the Lord’s Supper. Russ Moore (our dean of the school of theology at Southern) starts off the book. It’s hard to believe that Moore is actually articulating a Baptist position! As a lifelong Baptist, I have yet to come across Baptist pastors who articulate such a rich, (indeed sacramental) understanding of the memorialist view (except perhaps for Charles Spurgeon). Moore’s contribution includes the most Scripture – another good thing for a Baptist. He also rightly shows how different atonement theories are visible in the Lord’s Supper proclamation.

John Hesselink brings the Reformed position into view, quoting Calvin and the Reformed confessions at length. David Scaer clearly articulates the Lutheran position, and Thomas Baima contributes the chapter on the Roman Catholic view.

Understanding Four Views on the Lord’s Supper is a terrific addition to the Counterpoints series. I find much to be commended in each of the four views, though I would probably land somewhere in between the Baptist and Reformed perspective. The authors’ responses to the other contributors also help the reader distinguish the differing doctrines. After reading this book, I came across with a clearer understanding of how all of our theology is affected by or at least made evident in our doctrine of the Lord’s Supper.

I must not fail to mention the helpful appendix. This section includes confessions of faith from many traditions as well as a compendium of quotes from important church figures, both Protestant and Roman Catholic. One’s view of the Lord’s Supper will be enriched simply by spending time with the giants of church history whose thoughts are included in this book.

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November 6, 2007

The Fundamentalist Survival Mechanism

Filed under: Christianity, Church Issues, Reformed Theology — Trevin Wax @ 3:25 am

If a “fundamentalist” is a person who believes in the fundamental doctrines of the Christian faith (the virgin birth, the substitutionary atonement, the physical resurrection of Jesus, the perfect inspiration of Scripture), then count me in. I’m not ashamed to wear the label.

But it can be dangerous to be a fundamentalist.

We tend to exaggerate differences and distinctions in order to provide justification for our group’s existence.

We also tend to see “holiness” and “rightness” in terms of the doctrines that set us apart from other Christians, rather than the beliefs we hold in common with other Christians that set us apart from the world.

Growing up, I attended an independent, fundamentalist Baptist school. The independent Baptists split off from the Southern Baptist Convention last century due to the creeping influence of liberalism in the Convention materials and seminaries. As conservative churches and pastors left the SBC, the independent churches continued to grow, evangelize, and enjoy the spoils of liberalism’s detrimental legacy.

Now that the Conservative Resurgence has taken place and the Southern Baptist seminaries are controlled by conservatives who believe strongly in the fundamental doctrines of Christianity, one might expect the independents to be happy. Not so.

The independent Baptists call the conservative “takeover” only a “makeover.” They refuse to admit that the SBC is now heading in the right direction. After all, if the SBC has indeed launched a massive course correction, the independents’ main reason for existing independently disappears.

Nowadays independent Baptists are harping on other distinctives in order to preserve the rationale for their group’s existence.

They preach separation from Southern Baptists because the SBC is not “King James Only,” the SBC smiles on contemporary music, and Southern Baptists don’t believe that a woman who wears pants is in sin.

Sadly, the independent Baptist movement is slipping steadily down an increasingly irrelevant path, as its leaders cocoon themselves into a safe web of exaggerated distinctions – a web which will eventually squeeze the life out of the movement.

Do you see the trajectory? Herein lies the danger of fundamentalism.

A movement that receives its identity from protesting is likely to prolong its survival by finding smaller and more insignificant things to protest.

Other evangelicals are not immune to this trajectory either. If we are not careful, we will make second-order issues into first-order issues and follow the same path as our independent brothers and sisters.

When we makes gender issues a first-order matter and go so far as to call this a “gospel issue” (whether for or against women in pastoral ministry), we are exaggerating a distinction.

When we make formal Bible translations (over against the dynamic-equivalent translations) a test of fellowship and go so far as to express our hatred and derision for other translations, we are exaggerating a distinction.

When we decide that those who do not hold to the doctrines of grace (i.e. Calvinism) don’t truly understand the gospel, we are again exaggerating distinctions, providing rationale for our own existence at the expense of Christian fellowship.

I am convinced that much of our in-house squabbling over theological matters and our smug “pat-ourselves-on-the-back” attitude that says, Thank God I’m not like the egalitarians, the Emergents, the liturgical, the Arminians, the charismatics and the Catholics is actually a subconscious attempt to exaggerate the distinctions that provide us a reason for existing. We think of this exaggeration as a survival mechanism, but actually, it will kill our effectiveness.

Add to the mix publishing houses, seminaries, pastors and teachers and conferences that spend most of their time and resources perpetuating the distinctives and it’s not hard to see how small the stuffy the room of fellowship with “like-minded” Christians can become.

Let me be clear on something. I do not believe we should do away with doctrinal distinctives. I am a Reformed-leaning, complementarian, Bible-driven minister who holds tightly to the fundamentals of the faith.

But I will not confuse second-order doctrinal distinctives with first-order doctrines. Once we journey down that road, we’ll eventually start confusing third-order doctrinal distinctives with first order doctrines, and we’ll wind up as isolated, irrelevant, and shrill as our independent friends.

We should not locate our Christian identity in what separates us from other believers, but in the gospel that unites us with other believers, the gospel that calls us out of the world to serve the world.

Let’s beware of this tendency in fundamentalism and recommit to Christian fellowship and unity across denominational lines – avoiding both the temptation to compromise our distinctives and the temptation to exaggerate them.

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November 1, 2007

What I Like about the Anabaptists

Filed under: Christianity, Church Issues, Reformed Theology, Southern Baptist Convention, Theology — Trevin Wax @ 5:30 am

The Anabaptist movement is often considered the radical fringe of the Reformation. Many Anabaptist leaders were gripped by apocalyptic fervor and a mystical spirituality that emphasized experience over the written Word of God.

The argument can be made that the Anabaptists were the forerunners to today’s Baptists, because of the common belief of adult believer’s baptism. However, history indicates that today’s Baptists came out of the Puritan and Reformed tradition of Western Europe. The Anabaptists were the forerunners of today’s Mennonites, Amish, and Brethren denominations. The Anabaptist political influence is still felt in the works of writers like Brian McLaren and John H. Yoder.

Despite the early Anabaptists’ radicalism and experiential spirituality, the movement has some lessons that we should take to heart. I like 3 things about the early Anabaptists.

1. Emphasis on the subversive nature of the Church in relation to the State.

The Anabaptists were the only segment of the Reformation who actually could envision the existence of a church that was not tied to the state. Because of this, they correctly understood the nature of the true church as consisting of regenerate members and they also understood the theological conflicts between the kingdom of God and the kingdoms of this world better than the rest of the Reformers.

2. Life as a community.

The Anabaptists understood that the Christian life was meant to be lived in close-knit community and accountability. The other Reformers could not fully embrace this communal nature of Christianity because of their efforts to see Christendom reestablished by the state’s authority. The Anabaptists’ recovery of church discipline and accountability is remarkable, considering its virtual absence for hundreds of years.

3. Willingness to follow Scriptural teaching, without regard to personal comfort.

The Anabaptists correctly understood the biblical teaching of believer’s baptism and they were willing to stake their lives on this belief, because it was founded on a clear understanding of Scripture’s authority in the life of the church. They followed sola scriptura to their deaths, resting their faith in the Bible and not in church authority and tradition.

What about you? What do you like about the Anabaptists? What can we learn from the radical Reformers?

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