NowTHINK!AboutIt

Avoiding Hackneyed...Making Sense

Review: The Universal Christ by Richard Rohr

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Truth, like food, is better received when better prepared.

A Clanging Cymbal Expresses Adamance
Not Meaning

Before the Scopes trial, which ultimately was a debate between creation and evolution, William Jennings Bryan famously said, “if evolution wins, Christianity goes.”

He, like many other absolutists before and after him, was wrong. In the end, neither side could claim victory and Christianity hasn’t gone anywhere.

But it makes you wonder. How many other tightly held biblical ideas could be moderated without destroying faith and the Christian community?

The truth is Faith isn’t easily obliterated and science is not static. I believe in a young earth and a seven day creation but I know I can’t prove those ideas any more than evolutionists can conclusively prove the 13.7 billion year history they claim for the earth.

When conflicts like this occur, the only reasonable response is to respect the rights of others to think differently, share in the discussion and keep digging for facts. Both sides keep digging but the sharing part resembles a barrage of artillery shells flying both ways. Everyone is firing and ducking.

Instead of clarifying, the discussion separates and divides. Neither side seems to understand that ideas aren’t weapons and would be better used to stimulate thought than cause injury.

I understand how uncomfortable some ideas can be but I still find it difficult to refuse the discussion.

Before you walk away, remember that religionists are often the unreasonable party. They don’t argue, they dismiss. Religious conservatives, like the Catholics who put Galileo under house arrest for teaching the earth revolved around the sun, accept only compliance and obedience. Arguments, any arguments, are viewed as an offense against God and there is a long history of burning opposing ideas at the stake.

I’m saying that as one who was raised in religious conservatism. I learned the doctrines well and zealously complied but compelling ideas should never be ignored even if those ideas seem to rub faith the wrong way.

We should never be satisfied to ignore those ideas and always be open to new arguments and perspectives.

The question is where do you find those arguments. [Read more…] about Review: The Universal Christ by Richard Rohr

Has The Great Commission Been Supplanted By Politics

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Religion teaches us what is decent. Politics allows us to choose for ourselves.

Religion encourages us to believe
Politics encourages us to respect the beliefs of others.
Religious beliefs divide us into groups.
Politics unite us around shared interests.

For most of history, churches and church groups were very diverse and, therefore, divided from one another. That division had a positive effect. It kept churches from uniting and dominating society.

With consensus around a few ideas, however, that has changed. Churches have become politically rather than spiritually driven. Instead of trying to save souls – the thing they were commissioned to do – they’re trying to police souls and clean the world up.

What I’ve just described feels good to the faithful. It has the ring of rationality to it. What can be wrong with standing for the right? Anything other than opposing wrong seems too much like cowardice but regardless how courageous it may seem, that approach is not a replacement plan for the Great Commission and it won’t work. The world is not going to change for the better because we treat it with a dose of Lysol. Things won’t get better and God won’t be pleased.

Politics vs Religion

Politics and religion are both important but for two very different reasons. Neither can replace the other but there is friction between the two. They didn’t get along in the past and they don’t get along now for very obvious and acceptable reasons.

The capstone of politics, the one thing that makes it work, compromise, is the one thing churches have a long history of not tolerating. The one thing churches have done repeatedly, divide and go their separate ways (remember the Pilgrims), is the one thing governments can’t do.

But it’s not a stalemate. The idea isn’t for the two institutions to blend or mirror one another or vie. Each has an important job to do. Each needs to respect and allow the free function of the other.

Churches, however, are not comfortable with that idea. The Great Commission is the answer to their angst but it’s apparently not enough to keep them from interfering. [Read more…] about Has The Great Commission Been Supplanted By Politics

People Really Do Want To Work

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The difference between a job and a chain gang is remuneration.

A Living Wage
Is A Strong Motivation To Work Hard

My Dad drummed a strong work ethic into us from an early age.

Work!

Work hard!

Show up early and stay a little late.

Engage! Don’t stand around waiting for someone else to do the job.

Don’t wait to be told what to do. Find what needs to be done and do it.

People who don’t work, he complained, are lazy and they’re also the ones who inevitably get into trouble.

That’s a brief summary of his ideas and they’re generally good ones to live by. Bottom line? Work is a good thing and the Bible agrees but not only was he too job/boss centric, his droning made it seem more like a Chain Gang than an opportunity. [Read more…] about People Really Do Want To Work

Biblical Predestination Not Focused On Individuals Or Minutia

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What is the point of loving someone in this life if they are condemned to hell without recourse in the next?

Plans And Goals Are Predestinated
Not People
Part 3 of 3

Part 1 – Calvinism Has No Connection To Election Or Predestination

Part 2 – Biblical Election Has Many Applications

Predestination is definitely a biblical concept but we must be very careful how we apply it because, without very clear definitions and applications, it can mean anything.

Calvinists have taken it to mean God selected certain individuals in eternity past, before creation, and predetermined that they would be saved. That’s the upside. The downside is everyone else is condemned to hell without recourse.

What is amazing about this idea is the fact that the preselected ones can’t avoid it, they can’t aid it, and anyone not selected has no choice in the matter either. It’s all predestined, or so they would have us think.

The Calvinist version of Predestination literally cuts the heart and soul out of motivation. Some won’t try to believe because maybe they weren’t selected. Some won’t do more to evangelize because maybe the target audience wasn’t elected.

Who will be saved and who will not be saved is absolutely settled completely and entirely by God’s choice before creation.

Of course, these false ideas about Predestination don’t stand alone. They are aided and abetted by Calvinistic teachings on Election. When these two concepts start swirling, the effect is catalytic. People get caught in the resulting vortex and just give up.

Once Election is understood correctly, however, which was the point of my last post, it opens the door to a very different viewpoint on Predestination.

Predestination Doesn’t Kill Hope

The biggest problem with Calvinistic ideas about Predestination is they leave absolutely no wiggle room for variable outcomes and give no hope. That’s a problem. Hope is everything. We endure momentary difficulties because we have hope. We fight for survival because we have hope. Take hope away, which is what Calvinism does, and people tend to harden, not against God but against people.

Once you start picking individuals to favor with eternal bliss leaving the rest to suffer eternal torment, you lose traction. Why bother trying. All the important questions are settled and there is nothing anyone can do to change it.

Predestination Doesn’t Encourage Questionable Motives

A good question to ask is why does any Calvinist obey the commands of Scripture, like preach the Gospel to every creature and love your neighbor.

This may not be true in every case but one reason a preselected person would love their neighbor (which we are commanded to do, even the ones who are easy to hate), who also may not be selected, is to rub it in.

I’m one of the chosen and I’m so much better than you.

You may think I’m exaggerating, but visit a few churches where Calvinism reigns and tell me the atmosphere isn’t laced with a sense of superiority. If you’re not sure where to find such churches, just look for the words Reformed or Covenant in the name. That’s usually a dead giveaway, although you find all kinds of churches laced with Calvinism’s ideas these days.

There’s a good reason for this phenomenon. When you’re beliefs run contrary to your actions, it makes you look at least confused, maybe stupid. You have to do something to shore up apparent sophistication. If you’re not BEING the part, you have to try and LOOK the part. [Read more…] about Biblical Predestination Not Focused On Individuals Or Minutia

Biblical Election Has Many Applications

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If you don't do the hard work of becoming the person you need to be, you won't be able to do the thing you're called to do.

Election Is For Service Not Salvation
Part 2 of 3

Part 1 – Calvinism Has No Connection To Election Or Predestination

Part 3 – Biblical Predestination Not Focused On Individuals Or Minutia

Part 1 of this series focused on the many fallacies of Calvinism and there are many. Too many to enumerate in one post.

Calvinism raises so many questions that if you took each to its logical end, you would end up with a book, maybe a set, not just a post.

The previous post was intended to whet the appetite and set the stage for further investigation. The fallacies don’t explain Election or Predestination so the job isn’t done yet but they do reveal the questionable nature of Calvinism and that opens the door to a different approach.

So, what about Election.

Preliminary Thoughts

First, a few preliminary thoughts.

More than any other word, Election has become the anchor for Calvinistic thought. Everything Calvinists teach about any subject in the Bible is tethered to the idea that God selected some for salvation and deselected everyone else.

Calvinists don’t like it when their ideas are framed in those terms and they’ve produced a litany of sophisticated-sounding prose to suggest that isn’t true but when you boil it all down, if any person is not saved and doesn’t get saved before they die, they were deselected.

As we go along, it will become clear why that is the logical inference of Calvinist teachings.

There are several key passages that need to be explained but before we get into those, a few foundational observations are needed first.

Election Is Too Common To Be Special

First of all, a word about the word Elecction.

The word Election is just one word. It isn’t a unique word. It wasn’t specially coined in the Old Testament or New Testament to carry a strange, weird, or unusual meaning.

The word was never intended to become a theological Shibboleth. It’s not even particularly spiritual.

The New Testament writers haven’t said enough in context to impregnate it sufficiently with the idea that God did something before we were born to divide humanity into two groups: the ins and the outs.

The word simply means chosen and it can apply to all kinds of things. Making choices (elections), is very common.

We choose what we wear and eat each day, what we watch on TV, what we read, think, and more.

We choose how punctual we are, how we act under pressure, who we marry, spend time with, vote for, and so on.

People choose careers, places to live, and methods for managing money.

But the choices we make are always qualified or should be. Careless people make random, unqualified choices and suffer badly as a result. Words like thoughtless, irresponsible, negligent, and imprudent describe the random-choice approach to life.

And that is exactly what Calvinists are suggesting about God.

Election Presents Opportunities

Sometimes we make good choices. Sometimes we make bad choices. The good news is after we make bad choices, we can still choose to learn from the experience. Sometimes we do. Sometimes we don’t.

Choices shape our lives they don’t define us. [Read more…] about Biblical Election Has Many Applications