mclaren looks in the mirror

I have a practice when it comes to when liberals accuse conservatives of something--I immediate assume, until proven wrong, that the liberal is actually looking in a mirror, and accuses conservatives of the things that he/she/ is actually seeing of himself or herself.

For example, a common liberal mantra, mindlessly accepted by their minions, is that conservatives are racist. The truth is, the ones who are constantly stirring up race issues (see the latest example with Professor Gates) are liberals.

So, when a liberal like Brian McLaren tries to tell us about the Religious Right, I think it is rather revealing--about himself and his fellow lefties.

Four Lessons from the Religious Right

First, we need to learn from the mistakes of the Religious Right, which were legion. That requires us to get serious about a theology of civic responsibility and the common good, which, thankfully, groups like Sojourners, Faith in Public Life, Center for Public Justice, and others are (in their various ways) eager to help us do if more of us will pay attention. It’s not just the RR tactics that were amiss, and not just the strategy: On a deeper level it’s the theology that undergirded the whole affair that needs to be rethought.

Postmoderns like McLaren (I really think pomo and liberal are synonymous) love to "rethink" things, or at least pretend that they are.

But let's look at these groups he references. Sojo is already linked to, visit if you can stomach it. Here's a bit about the misnamed Faith in Public Life.

Pro-choice and pro-life faith leaders find common ground, shared values on abortion

Faith in Public Life has worked for years to build common ground on abortion among ideologically diverse religious leaders. Several of these courageous advocates gathered on Capitol Hill along with secular groups and Members of Congress Thursday to express support for The Preventing Unintended Pregnancies, Reducing the Need for Abortion and Supporting Parents Act, and numerous others -- pro-choice and pro-life alike -- issued statements endorsing it.

There may be issues out there about which a degree of compromise is acceptable, but abortion is not one of them. If abortion is truly murder, then to compromise in the hopes of not having as many (a vain hope, I think) will not cut it. The legel recognition of the murder of one unborn child through abortion is unacceptable, and compromise is cowardly and disgusting.

The Center for Public Justice seems along the same lines, though to their credit they take a bit stronger stance against abortion. Still, their economic rhetoric has a tinge of the left to it.

Second, we need to seek — prayerfully and humbly, and rooted in more seasoned theological reflection — more constructive and wise ways to invest civic energy for the common good, because the antidote to bad political engagement is not no political engagement, but rather wise and effective political engagement.

Yeah, like I consider his and Sojo's political engagement "wise and effective".

Third, we need to avoid overreacting, baptizing an agenda of the left (or center, or whatever) with the same kind of naivete that the right’s agenda previously embraced. The temptation to overreact will grow greater as the Religious Right II re-forms (as it will no doubt do), perhaps as a more extreme, fractious, reactionary, and perhaps even militant group than before.

For one, he's a bit late if he thinks Sojo and the pseudo-christian left hasn't already baptized the left's agenda, and I mean him, too.

The think that stuck out to me in first reading this, though, was his last sentence, because far from describing any Religious Right II, it perfectly describes the left.

Extreme? Do names like ACORN and Rev. Wright ring a bell?

Fractious? Ask Joe Liebermann about how they handle dissent.

Reactionary? Watch the news talk show on cable over this recent Prof. Gates dust-up. Assumption of the officer's guilt is already rampant among them.

Militant? Consider how they try to make soem opposing views "hate speech".

As I said, McLaren looked in a mirror, and accused the other side of what his side is doing.

Fourth, we need to avoid shaming those who now realize their efforts in the Religious Right were misguided.

Thanks, but keep your pity, please. Some of us want nothing to do with your religious left, Mr. McLaren. It's stinks to lowest hell.

kids going wild

...On his first visit to our church--at the ripe old age of one week--he was passed around, cooed over, gazed at, nuzzled, and loved. When he began toddling, he toddled all over the place, wandering freely around our gathering space while we sang, listened, prayed, and discussed. He has shouted out the names of his friends from the balcony in the middle of a sermon. He has walked around the guy making announcements. He has been quite literally at the center of our worship on many a Sunday, walking around like he owns the place.
Carla Barnhill, in the book An Emergent Manifesto of Hope, pp. 53-54

First, for the sake of disclosure, I am not and have never been a parent. I have been around children a good bit, and, of course, at one time was a child.

In regards to the above, here goes...

I find it hard to believe that the writer thinks that a newborn being "passed around, cooed over, gazed at, nuzzled, and loved" is somehow an experience unique to emergent (non)churches, yet it does read as if she think the experience is something that only happens in such places. Seriously, if a newborn is taken into almost any church worth it's salt, it'll get much the same treatment. I've seen it happen.

Now, let me ask...when did teaching children basic manners and etiquette, and discipling them to enforce those weapons, become a bad thing? I mean, seriously, is having a child shouting out a friend's name in the middle of a sermon something parents should be encouraging and allowing? Would they allow their child to do the same in a classroom, or at a speech, on in a movie theater?

Dealing with children's antic with wisdom is important. I question the wisdom not only of allowing and encouraging such behavior, but writing a portion of a book encouraging parents to let their kiddies make a ruckus while a preacher is preaching.

pomo gods

ht centuriOn, and a small nod to Neil Gaiman for inspiration for this entry's name.

Their Frenzies and Crusades

They do not see Tetzel in carbon offsets. They do not see shuning in the treatment the neighborhood gives the guy who doesn't sort his garbage according to the dictates of the regulatory bishops. They don't see a fierce imposition of morality in their crusades for the sake of saving us all from climate change. They do not see blasphemy laws in thought crimes legislation. They do not see their religion in everthing they do, and this is because idolaters are blind.

It's not the first time I've heard at least parts of the modern (postmodern) concerns over the essentially trivial as being religion-like, particular in regards to the environment. I guess I would add, though, that some do go into that mindset with their eyes open--not just those who Gaia-worship, but those who try to spin God into creation in a pantheistic/panentheistic way. There are also those who see the Christian hope of Heaven and the return of Christ as "escapism", trying to push their own concerns for the here-and-now.

There is less excuse for Christians -- who are not blind in this way -- for going along with any of it. If you have ever wondered how an ancient Israelite, who had been fed by manna from the sky, could possibly have been attracted to one of the Canaanite groves and high places, just look at the pressure you feel to flush the toilet less, to take shorter showers, to get a smaller car, and to go through any number of other gyrations to reduce your carbon footprint. This is what syncretism always feels like. The gravitational pull is always this strong. And this is not being said in order to make you empathize with that ancient Israelite who was going native. This is being said to stir you up enough to make a name for yourself the way Phineas did.

Of course, peer-pressure is starting to become legal-pressure. By what I've heard, it will soon be legally necessary to buy bio-hazard light bulbs. And there may be laws set up so our energy usages can be monitored (and can curtails be far behind?).

And so liberty is lost, with thunderous applause, as the last Star Wars movie far too prophetically stated.

rollins cheap-shotting fundies

This is an amusing bit of fiction...

Fundamentalism isn’t too violent, it isn’t violent enough

emphases mine

The title for this post comes from the title of one of the talks I have been giving on the ‘Lessons’ tour. The main gist of the argument lies in exploring how the fundamentalism we witness at work today is, at its core, a movement that conserves and preserves the status quo. Its violence at the subjective level (e.g. defending the evils of misogyny, homophobia, unjust conflicts and self-interested foreign policy) is the direct outworking of its ultimate impotence when it comes to instigating real change.

So, right off, we know what Rollins is both for, and against. Being for some things, we see that what he considers "real change" has to do with the acceptance of those things--so, for example, "real change" for him would likely involve the recognition and legalization of glbtwhatever relationships, a dismantling of the military and extreme pacifism, and foreign policy that feigns concern for others while spreading the poverty inherent in socialistic economic policies.

Any positions that go against those thing, then, he must per force denounce and, as in this topic, mislabel.

Take the example of so many wars today. Amidst all their violence they are more often than not fought in order to preserve the way things are, to protect people in power, or to accumulate more resources. Thus their horrific violence at the subjective level hides the fact that they preserve the deeper objective violence of the system itself. The bloodshed thus helps to maintain the injustice that currently exists, ensuring that structures of oppression remain unchallenged

Reading this, I thought of the scene early in Monty Python's Quest for the Holy Grail. "The violence inherent in the system, the violence inherent in the system. Look, I'm being oppressed."

But let's take the war in Iraq. Was that fought to preserve those in power? Considering that Hussein is quite dead, the answer is "no". Did it preserve the way things were? The ink-stained fingers of the Iraqis who voted for their new leaders tells otherwise. Did it preserve the deeper objective violence of the old system itself? No. If anything, it's those who want something like the old system who are fighting hardest against the new system.

In the same way fundamentalism, while violent at a surface level (at the level of everyday life) is simply a mask that hides the fact that it does not rock the very foundations of worldly power.

Getting back to the topic at hand, Rollins is obviously mistaken here. If anything (in typical liberal fashion, and make no mistake, Rollins is a flaming lib), the accusations he tries to make against fundamentalists are the ones most applicable to him and his ilk.

If anything, fundamentalists are the ones that can "rock the very foundations of worldly power", precisely because they are the ones who don't care to. While Rollins and company are playing "let's pretend to be counterculture while we try to make the culture in our own image", the fundamentalists, like Jesus, are not playing those games. Just as Jesus was not some kind of counterculture comic figure, but lived rightly even if it was against culture, so fundamentalists are more interested in living rightly no matter how cultural or counter-cultural it is.

Which is precisely where Rollins and his like go wrong (even more so when the culture does become like them and they go along with it in sheep-like fashion). Christianity is not about being counter-cultural, or even cultural. It's about being right with God.

emergents outfoxing themselves

Several weeks ago, I got in a bit of a row over at the blog at the Emergent Village website (the place where the name of this blog got it's name, in a sardonic way). The author of the particular entry was going on about something, and a few times he made mention of the name Matthew Fox, in a way that seemed rather approving and as a source for many of his or her thoughts. A bit of a scan of the internet for Fox's ideas was quite enough to show me this guy was poison, but being curious still more, a bit ago I found, at a used book store (for it's not worth the regular price), a copy of his work "The Coming of the Cosmic Christ".

I've been going through it, on and off, for a few weeks, sometimes reading parts straight through, others kind of skipping.

It is a source of amusing, of a rather sad sort I admit, that two names that have surfaced in this so-called emergent conversation have been Matthew Fox and Ken Wilbur, because despite difference in their ways of putting things, in the end they're both saying roughly the same thing.

Fox's book makes mention of something he calls the Cosmic Christ. What does he mean by that?

We are divine and human, animal and demon. We are Cosmic Christs.
Matthew Fox, The Coming of the Cosmic Christ, p. 138

The name "Christ" means "the anointed one." All of us are anointed ones. We are all royal persons, creative, godly, divine, person of beauty and grace. We are all Cosmic Christs, "other Christs."
p. 137

Yeah, that hissing sound you hear, it is the hiss of the serpent of the Garden, saying the same thing, "You shall be as God".

This guy misuses the Bible so badly, it's laughable. It's like he's emergent before emergents ever were.

Paul celebrates the theme of our being other Christs and our growing into other Christs when he says, "I live now not with my own life but with the life of Christ who lives in me" (Gal. 2:20)
p. 139

While Fox does give the reference, one can read it and rightly wonder, where the heck does he get anything he claims Paul is saying here???

Galatians 2, NIV
17. If, while we seek to be justified in Christ, it becomes evident that we ourselves are sinners, does that mean that Christ promotes sin? Absolutely not!

18. If I rebuild what I destroyed, I prove that I am a lawbreaker.

19. For through the law I died to the law so that I might live for God.

20. I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live it in the body I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

21. I do not set aisde the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing.

Someone, please tell me where in those verses Paul anywhere says anything about us "celebrating the theme or our being other Chirsts and our growing into other Christs"? Please, I beg of you, where is it?

And that statement is coming from a man emergents want us to look to?

Fox's statement is right up there with Rollins' about how disobedience is a good thing. Both are evil to the core, and are adequate reasons to reject emergents until they repent of their associations with such blasphemers.

just so's you'll know...

I just got finished looking through the list of Sojo's June postings...

And not one of them had to do with defending Sarah Palin's daughter against Letterman's sick joke. Not even in their mealy-mouthed double-speaking way.

Yeah, there's their view of justice of you.

oozing down the slippery slope

I don't know if they've done it before, but if not, the emergent mag site The Ooze has put out an article in favor of the postmodern redefinition of marriage, with the usual parade of whining nonsense contained in it.

Marriage for the Masses

It’s important that we begin to realize that not every marriage is be a cookie cutter and that we, as Christians (whether we believe that we hold all absolute truth or not) do not have the right to condemn a person based on their lifestyle choices.

But apparently we can condemn others for thinking differently, right? Especially if they believe in things like right and wrong, and base those beliefs on what the Bible teaches?

Let’s stop fighting for oppression.

Like I said, whining nonsense. Apparently, one if 'oppressive' if one doesn't give in to the sob stories liberals (and now emergents, assuming emergents are any different now) put out.

How is that, in any way, showing the love of the one who came to this earth to love all people, eat with the worst of us and buy us with tremendous sacrifice?

Yeah, Jesus wasn't really against the woman found in adultery doing what she was doing. He didn't tell her to stop doing that sin. He just wanted to have a cup of jo with her, and talk about how accepting he was of her lifestyle of cheating on her husband.

It is time to be about the ministry of reconciliation. We cannot demand that homosexuals live up to some “undisputed standard” when we fail to live up such standards.

We all know that we do not "live up to some "undisputed standard"" (whatever that is). We all know that we have sinned. We ask nothing of anyone that we have not done ourselves--repent and put your faith in Christ, and live no longer in sin.

Wait a bit longer, and soon the oozers will take the next steps. What will that be? Supporting groups like NAMBLA and their disgusting evil? Sojo has already had an article the clearly supported pre-marital sex.

Perhaps the final outcome of their attempts to do away with the secular/sacred divide is that there is nothing sacred in their eyes.

wishful thinking

You're right. I was referring to the fact that most Protestant seminaries fight with vigor the battles of yesterday, largely oblivious to the issues of today, hardly thinking of the issues of tomorrow. They still preoccupy themselves with fight the Protestant Reformation and the liberal-fundamentalist debates. (Somebody tell them those wars are over, OK?)...
Brian McLaren, A New Kind of Christian, p. 145

This echoes a bit of something written earlier.

...And what about the United Campus Ministries group? Why weren't they invited? I know some of you are thinking, "Because they're too liberal, and we're all evangelical." Well, if I'm right, those distinctions are about to become inconsequential. So I'd imagine that when you plan a joint activity among your various groups in the future, you'd be wise to broaden the invitation...
pp. 40-41

It's a quite common tactic, actually. Heck, one may think that people like McLaren actually believe it. One can see it, for example, in the debates about Creation and Evolution--to the minds of those like McLaren, Evolution is the 'truth', so trying to say anything about Creation is essentially meaningless and a waste of time, we may as well roll over, call the first couple of chapters of Genesis a myth, and try to wring out some of kind of mythical, probably liberal and politically correct, meaning from it. Disbelieve the true God and believe the contradictory 'facts' of men who want us to discard God.

Or, there's the more modern ploy of global warming. Never mind how the facts disprove it, how it's all so obviously a leftist politcal ploy, how it's being used to take away our freedoms. We don't have time to debate it, or to seek the truth, or to find real answers. No, we have to dive head-first into whatever the nincompoops in government put into their legislation, and we have to do yesterday, because we have to tell ourselves we're doing something, even if it's hacking off our own noses and shooting ourselves in the feet.

It's a tactic designed to silence debate, to 'move beyond' what they think we should move beyond. It's a tactic designed to make those who have not surrendered those debates to seem of no consequence.

Now, what has to be asked, is, is the liberal/fundamentalist (or, if I may, conservative) debate really ended? Is there no reason to fight the same battles those during the Protestant Reformation fought?

It's rather amusing, I think, that liberals will say such things, even as they are the ones who themselves are fighting the battles. They will attack, then besmirch those who defend.

So, for example, people like Borg and Crossan can tell us that the Gospels are mostly stories made up by the early church, with barely a smidgen of the real life of Jesus in them. They can tell us that there were no real miracles, that Jesus' body was never buried but was eaten by wild dogs, that there was no resurrection. They can tell us that we should look for truth about Jesus in aberrant Gnostic gospels filled with nonsense.

And then, when people refute their arguments with the truth, they will say that there is no debate, it's futile to continue trying to defnd the authority and inerrancy of Scripture, and "Somebody tell them those wars are over, OK?"

Well, they're not. Or they would be, if poeple like McLaren would surrender their vain imaginations. As it is, they would rather hold to them then not, wanting the respect of men more than of God.

ackbar called it

..."Let me ask you a question, Daniel. Where is teh foundation for the home of this spider?" I replied, "Well, I guess it doesn't exactly have one. But it does have anchor points--like where the web attachesto that leaf and that branch and that branch there..."

"Ok," Neo said, "I think you can see where I'm going. What if faith isn't best compared to a building, but rather to a spiderweb? Instead of one foundation, it has several anchor points. Those points might be spiritual experiences, exemplary people and institutions whom one has come to trust, that sort of thing." "But where does the Bible fit in?" I asked.

"Well," Neo replied, "it could be seen as one of the anchor points. Or perhaps every passage in the Bible that has affected your life could be seen as an anchor point. Or perhaps the Bible isn't only in the anchor point. Perhaps it is part of every thread of the web."

I wasn't satisfied. "But I think you're stretching things, Neo. I mean, why just pick a spiderweb as your model for faith? That seems kind of arbitrary, doesn't it?"

"No more than a building with a foundation, really. When you think about it, a spiderweb has some real advantages over a building. It's flexible. It can be repaired when it's damaged. It functions as both a home and a tool for catching food...
Brian McLaren, A New Kind of Christian, pp. 54-55

For one thing, the idea of the Church as a building is not arbitrary, but biblical. We have the passage where Jesus tells Peter that upon the rock of the confession of Jesus as the Christ, He will build His Church. There is also the passage where we are told the church is built on "the foundation of the Apostles and the Prophets, Jesus Christ being the chief corner stone".

And what could the Apostles and the Prophets be for us today, but the Scriptures (with apologies to Peter Wagner and the other pretenders).

But, what is a spider's web? Is it really a home?

I've seen spider's webs, and will not deny that there is something like beauty in them, though best appreciated from a distance. I can remember seeing one foggy morning, large webs visible with beads of water on them, stretched between the lines on overhead power and telephone cables, one after the other, dozens of them. I've also seen smaller one one porches and in trees and other places.

But what is a spider's web?

To my observation, spider's don't really seem to live on their webs; rather, the web seems to be place they work, or to use a better word, hunt. In that sense, it may be seen as an office.

But I think a better way of seeing the web is as a trap.

McLaren does make mention of it, in the above excerpt, where he says it's "a tool for catching food". But if one looks at it as a trap, one can see that a trap is a very different thing from a home or a building.

For example, if one thinks of metal leg traps, one can note that one of those doesn't have a foundation, but it does have an anchor point. Or one of those snares that catch legs and hang the creature by them, those have no foundation but an anchor point much like the web does.

I suppose one could think of traps that do have foundations, just as one could think of houses that don't have foundations like we think of (houses in trees, maybe). But I think a spider's web has more in common with a trap, than with a house or building.

looks like i wasn't the first...

...to notice the "Bible idolatry" argument some like the emergents are starting to use.

And, thankfully, some better able to form arguments against it have done so.

A Thought on Bibliolatry

The Psalmist is a Bibliolater?

From the second link...

Those who use it often draw a false dichotomy saying we should follow Jesus or God but not be enslaved to a book. A simple response could be: which Jesus? Whose God? How do I know them. To say we should follow Jesus and not the Bible or Jesus more than the Bible is a radical dichotomy of the worst sort. Jesus teaches us that all of the Scriptures point to Him. Jesus Himself uses the Bible authoritatively--i.e. in a way that those leveling the charge of bibliolatry consider idolatrous. In fact, the Bible is the only infallible marker to Jesus Christ. It is a covenant treaty that is given to God's people...almost like a marriage certificate. It is a treaty from our Great Kind announcing to us that He is reconciling Himself to the world in the person of Jesus Christ. In short, we have no kingdom charter without the text of Scripture... no way of being sure if the kingdom of God has indeed dawned in the Son

This link is found in the second link above.

Is Bibliolatry Possible?

A fine theologian of whom I asked the question thinks that bibliolatry is possible and that the scribes and Pharisees were guilty of it. Now we must guard against laying all the intellectual sins ever conceived at the feet of the poor scribes and Pharisees. They have quite enough sobering problems. But were they bibliolaters to boot? Well, they did highly honor the words of Scripture. Whatever else you say about scribes and Pharisees, they knew the Book. Look, for instance, at those of whom Herod inquired regarding the Messiah's birthplace. "Bethlehem of Judea!" they snapped off, "For so it has been written by the prophet, 'And you, Bethlehem, land of Judah...'" Let me ask you. How well do you know Micah's prophecy?

But it is a tragic fact that the scribes and Pharisees, though knowing the words of the Book, knew not its Author. "You know neither me nor my Father," pronounced Jesus. Perhaps it is bibliolatry to know the Book but not its Publisher. To know dead precepts, but not the living God. "Thou shalt love the Bible thy Book with all thine heart, soul, and strength. But God is expendable." However, let me ask you this: How did Jesus answer the bibliolatrous folk of his day?

Jesus answered wrong users of the Book with the Book. Is bibliolatry possible then? Not easily, but yes, I suppose bibliolatry may possibly occur in some extreme cases. Yet is it bibliolatry to hold to a high view of Scripture or to attribute infallibility or other divine attributes to God's Word? How about substituting God's actions with the Bible's record of his acts? "The Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith. . . ."

No, what some may call bibliolatry is not always- indeed, is rarely such. Let us truly love the Lord our God with all our hearts and worship him only. But "to reverently esteem" the Book, "the heavenliness of the matter, the efficacy of the doctrine, the majesty of the style, the consent of all the parts, the scope of the whole...is to give all glory to God." 3 Even to love God's Word has good precedent in our Lord Jesus himself: "Oh, how I love your law! It is my meditation all the day long...I hate and abhor falsehood, but I love your law...But these things were written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life."

I now call on those who posted on this blog, and accuse me of bibliolatry even if they did not use that name, to respond to these things I've posted here. Put up or shut up.

phar i see

Finally, he (Neo) spoke up. He seemed to have been having his own internal conversation: "Besides, the whole notion of authority as so many people conceive if is thoroughly modern." Now, I must have looked even more confused, because Neo gently hit me on the shoulder, smiled, and winked. "Relax, Dan, I'm only saying what the Bible says. That oft-quoted passage in Second Timothy doesn't say, 'All Scripture is inspired by God and is authoritative.' It says that Scripture is inspired and useful--useful to teach, rebuke, correct, instruct us to live justly, and equip us for our mission as people of God. That's a very different job description than we moderns want to give it. We want it to be God's encyclopedia, God's rule book, God's answer book, God's scientific text, God's easy-step instruction book, God's little book of morals for all occasions. The only people in Jesus' day who would have had anything close to these expectations of the Bible would have been the scribes and Pharisees. Right?
Brian McLaren, A New Kind of Christian, p. 52

Delve into the world of emergent enough, and you'll find that they love to play the Pharisee card--all those who question them in the wrong ways (question as in seriously challenge), who disagree with them, who stand by what the Bible says, and don't approve the things they (emergents) want us to approve of, almost invariable get the Pharisee label stuck on us by them.

You can see it in the above, pretty easily. Those of us who accept the word of the living and true God about how He created the world over the words of men who can't even agree among themselves over how the process of evolution took place, are labelled those who want the Bible to be "God's scientific text". Those of us who look to the Bible for moral guidance and standards are labelled those who want the Bible to be "God's little book of morals for all occasions".

And, of course, we are shelved right down there with the Pharisees.

But was that the Pharisees' mistake? Were they wrong?

I've had some experience with being around Christians who were legalistic.In my youth, I heard plenty about the evils of rock music, tv, movies, smoking, long hair on boys and pants on girls. But I still call them Christians because, even while legalistic, they would say that living their way was not the thing that saved a person, but only faith in Christ. Whatever their faults, they didn't go that far.

In Romans, Paul deals with the problems his people had with the way God had opened for their salvation. "They have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge". Their problem was that they had tried to use the law to "establish their own righteousness", and "did not submit to God's righteousness". Salvation is by grace, not by works.

In one of Jesus' stories, he contrasts the prayer of a Pharisee with that of a tax collector. The Pharisee's prayer was full of pride in his own goodness and good works, while the tax collector could only pray for God's mercy. It's plain from the story that Jesus approved of the tax collector and not of the Pharisee.

The Pharisees' problem, I think it may safely be said, was that they tried to make themselves right with God through their own works, they tried to earn eternal life, and at least one result was a pride that could only be considered noxious.

One thing that I think their problem wasn't was in taking the Scriptures seriously--if anything, they should have taken them even more seriously then they did. Their problem wasn't in thinking there was an Adam, a Noah, and a Moses, but in thinking that simply because they could trace their ancestry back to Moses, then they were ok (something that even a cursory reading of the OT should have made plain wasn't true).

And so, I can only smile and shake my head at what I consider a false and misleading little misdirection of McLaren's part here. Sorry, but the Pharisee label doesn't fit.

(oh, and note to neo--if the pharisees were so all-fired modern, then obvious it shoots down your argument about authority as we think of it being thoroughly modern, right?)

jones is so right, and so wrong

Why It Matters that Jesus REALLY Rose

One of the strangest things about Tony Jones is that, at least in the emergent circles he runs in, he seems to be the most "right", in more ways than one. But then, he's also the one who's most publicly come out in support of the wrong, especially in regards to so-called sexual lifestyles.

In the blog entry linked to above, he makes one of the better arguments for the reality of Jesus' life and death and resurrection.

While the Jesus Seminar infamously rejected the miracles as mythological fables, I think it's important that Jesus healed real people of real maladies. The inauguration of a new age would be rather impotant if Jesus wasn't able to heal an actual, physical, historical woman who had suffered from non-stop mentrual flow for years, thus disqualifying her from Temple worship. Yes, she was real, and her blood was real, and her healing really meant that she could join with God's people and experience temple worship.

Why is that important? Because I'm a real person. Because the people to whom I have ministered in Jesus' name are real persons. We're not hypotheses, fables, or legends. And we need real healing, all of us. While our realities may be largely socially constructed, we have real DNA, real physical, material properties.

Thus, since the resurrection of Jesus is his defeat of death, evil, and grief, it's important to me that it really happened. Without a resurrected Jesus, Christianity is impotent. (Exhibit A: liberal Christianity) And I don't mean a Jesus who was "resurrected" in the Disciples' hearts, and in my heart. I mean a real resurrection in the space-time continuum by a physical being known as Jesus of Nazareth, as 99.99% of Christians for the last two milennia have believed.

Despite the pomo-creep into his thinking here, it's actually pretty good. He mentions nothing about the Bible's own accounts of the resurrection and how important it is, as Paul wrote "If Christ is not raised, our hope is in vain, we are still in our sins, and are of all people most miserable". Still, kudos to the good try for Jones.

But literally bookending this statement of his, he tries to tie himself in knots.

And I understand where they're coming from, because I don't feel the same way about the historic facticity of Adam and Eve, the Tower of Babel, Jonah living in the belly of a fish, or Job's family and cattle being wiped out by God...

So, here's my pledge: I'm going to keep theologizing about ways to affirm historic, orthodox Christianity while undermining the historic Christian perspectives on social issues like slavery, the role of women, and homosexual rights.

It would be amusing, if it weren't so sad.

Jones has bought into the liberal definition of love, which isn't love at all--call it permissiveness, relativism, tolerance, but never call it by the noble name of love. Should he ever see that the most unloving thing he can do is to encourage people in their sinful lifestyles, he will have made a great step forward. Other men may say he is unloving if he should do so, but that is not important.

coincidence???

First, a couple of things, recent comments people have left on this blog. This first from a few weeks ago.

I would say the verse from roman's you quoted was describing a time before the Bible was together - the hearing there was not hearing the Bible.

And, if you are some how suggesting that faith starts with the Bible, then I might suggest that your faith is really in the Bible and I implore you to put your faith in God.

And this recent one, from this past weekend.

oh good grief, Jazzact. You never change.

Simple question for you: Is *scripture* the *source* of your salvation? If you answer yes you are an idolater. If you answer no than you are in agreement with Blake on this more than you care to admit.

It was in thinking about how to respond to this last one that I remembered the first, and it was in think of that that I noticed that there seems to be some parallels in their thinking--the implication and accusation that I (and likely by extension, all like me) have faith in the Bible rather than in God.

Which leads me to wonder if this is emergent's new tack, to accuse those who believe in the inspiration, infallibility, and authority of the Bible of having faith in the Bible rather than in God.

I don't know if anyone else has encountered this, or how they have responded, but if this is as new to you as it was to me, here's the deal--it's an absolutely asenine argument, not worthy of these people's supposed intelligence to be making, and they should know better.

I have faith in God's Word because I have faith in God. I don't make some kind of stupid distinction which says "I believe in God, so I can not believe what He has said". We tell people what the Bible says so that they know what God said, so they have in Him that is more than a mere vague assent to a new-agey warm fuzzy.

I don't play the "Bible is a man-made construct" because it isn't--it is the divinely inspired Word of God.

2 Peter 1
"19And we have the word of the prophets made more certain, and you will do well to pay attention to it, as to a light shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts. 20Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet's own interpretation. 21For prophecy never had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

To my mind, I see no reason to answer the accusations in the above quotes from (I suppose) emergent commentors here; rather, they and emergents as a whole should answer to how they play fast-and-loose with Scripture, trying to make it fit their own pre-conceived notions and either discarding or openly opposing it's moral teachings.

happy b-day

Since Dilbert is an occasional source of inspiration and insight here, it's only fair to shout-out Scott Adams' self-cameo in the strip, and to hope his birthday is a good one.

the continuing

I really didn't read this until a few minutes ago, though I'm not unfamiliar with Tickle and her attempts to say the sola scriptura is ending. I think this does lend a perspective to what I pointed out in the last post about McLaren's words about scripture. Emphases mine.

What Happens After Sola Scriptura?

So, admitting the immanent end of Sola Scriptura is not a categorical rejection of Scripture as much; rather, it is a coming to terms with our own limitations and finitude as human beings and adopting a certain humility about our readings. I seriously doubt whether the Bible is infallible since it was written by pre-modern men (yes, they were men). But that doesn’t mean I don’t think the Bible is authoritative or instructional. It merely means that I believe our ability as humans to fully understand the Bible is severely limited. The history of hermeneutics is indicative of this. We can very quickly identify points today where we believe our theological ancestors were absolutely wrong in their interpretation of Scripture (slavery, subjugation of women, etc.). I’m sure 50-100 years from now our grandchildren will say the same about us. We know things today that we didn’t know in the past and we don’t know things now that we will in the future. That deeply affects out readings. We are fallible, broken people. We need to hold our hemeneutical lenses loosely.

But how do we avoid simply throwing out the baby with the bathwater? Here is what I propose: let’s use a new word, a word that still retains a deep sense of respect and affection for the Scriptures and the history of God’s salvific action in history with God’s people. A word that doesn’t allow the spirit of the Reformation (and the Enlightenment) to crust over into static dogma. I like the word prima. Prima Scriptura. Scripture is without a doubt our primary authority and primary source for theological reflection, but is not and cannot be our sole source. We are more complex than that. Scripture is our prime witness to God’s interaction with God’s people, beckoning them/us to join in God’s divine endeavor of restoration and renewal. It seems to me that opting for a phrase such as this preserves our identity as Christians whose story and history is told in the Bible, but at the same admits our limitations, approaching divine revelation with deep humility, and understanding that we get it wrong all the time so we mustn’t hold our readings so tightly because they are fallible. What better way to remain open and attentive to the movement and dynamism of the Spirit? A Spirit that no matter how limited and broken we have become, meets us exactly where we are pushes us — and our readings of Scripture — toward continual transformation and revision.

Let us celebrate the end of Sola Scriptura. But let’s not stop there. Let’s provide a healthy alternative, something that still places its trust in the Holy Writ as the primary source for revelation and yet is still open to continual revision and divine redaction. Let us embrace Prima Scriptura.

Why is this person trying to downplay the role Scripture to mere a role (though a primary one), instead of the source for us? Why is he unwilling to say that Scripture is infallible? A bit of diggin on his own site, which he links to on the EV blog above, probably shows why.

“Thoughts on Homosexuality.”

I am confident that 50, maybe 75 years from now we will have resolved the “gay issue”
as some call it. We will have reached a consensus and moved on. It will be a non-issue,
instead we as a church will likely be splintering over another hot button issue. In fact, I
imagine my grandchildren and great-children will look back on my generation with the
same sort of wide-eyed amazement and disbelief that I feel when I look back on my
ancestors who participated in slavery, denied women the right to vote, and promoted
white supremacy. They will wonder why in the world it took us so long to shake free
from our oppressive self-imposed myopia of denying the reality that God uses all persons
even those of different sexual orientations. They will wonder, like many have since
Constantine officiated the wedding of the church and the nation-state, why the church,
who should always be the first to decry injustice and oppression, once again remained
silently and paralytically complacent with the diseased status quo.

One of my favorite passages in the New Testament is Galatians 3:28 where Paul conveys
this message most explicitly, “There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or
free, there is no longer male or female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” Because I
believe that Christianity is inherently contextual–indeed, that is the very essence of the
incarnation–and because I believe it is the task of the church and of the Christian to
interpret and re-interpret the scriptures within their contemporary worlds, I can’t help but
wonder how Paul might write that verse were he here today. Perhaps it might be
something like this, “There is no longer graced or ungraced, there is no longer gay or
straight, there is no long heterosexual or homosexual; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”

I could go on and talk about Jesus’ life and his welcoming the unwelcomed, accepting the
unaccepted, and loving the unloved, enabling the disenfranchised, but I won’t. We know
the story. At least I think we do. Perhaps we know the story, we just don’t believe it.
Perhaps we need to be converted to the true essence of the gospel, to our high and noble
calling to re-imagine the world, acknowledging that all persons, regardless of sexual
orientation, are invited to respond to grace and to participate in God’s work in/with/to the
world nurturing this alternative reality called the kingdom of God.

Amazing, isn't it, how for these emergents, it all comes back to sex.

There is an agenda behind their attempts to diminish Scripture--Scripture simply doesn't support their positions, so they must find ways to work around it while saying they're not abandoning it.

taking His Word for it

..."Over here you have the conservatives, who look at the Bible the same way medieval Catholics looked at the church and pope: infallible, inerrant, absolutely authoritative. Then over here you have the liberals, who see the Bible more or less as a collection of artifacts, reflections of the religious life of the Jewish and early Christian people--inspiring, perhaps even inspired in places, but not authoritative..."

He (Neo) continued "What if the real issue is not the authority of the text down on this line but rather the authority of God, moving mysteriously up here on a higher level, a foot above the ground? What if the issue isn't a book we can misinterpret with amazing creativity but rather the will of God, the intent of God, the desire of God, the wisdom of God--maybe we should say the kingdom of God?"
Brian McLaren, A New Kind of Christian, pp 50-51

There is a subtlety here that I've had a hard time seeing through, but I think I'm starting to understand it now.

I can't remember where, but I've heard or read of some emergent who has said the we conservative have made the Bible into a "paper Pope", which seems to be what McLaren is saying in that first paragraph, when he says conservatives view the Bible as Catholics used to view the Pope.

But that argument refutes nothing. If anything, it's like taking a forgery of an art work and using it to disprove the existence of the real piece of art. Mankind taking the words of a mere man as being as authoritative and infallible as the Word of God only shows mankind's errors, not that the Bible is not to be viewed as infallible, inerrent, and absolutely authoritative.

The subtlety comes in in the next paragraph, where McLaren through his character Neo tries to separate the will of God from the Word of God, or maybe a more accurate way of saying that is he's separating what one thinks is the will of God from what one thinks of the Word of God.

He begins by trying to separate the question of the authority of the Word of God from the question of the authority of God. The problem becomes, though, that once he's done that, how does he intend to know the authority of God in regards to what God's will is? If God is authoritative, then why is the Word He gave us less authoritative? If God's Word isn't authoritative, then how are to know for certain what the will of God is?

One can see how this works out in the ideas of liberals such as Borg and Crossan and Spong--the Bible to them is largely a work of mythical fiction, with little real history buried in the obviously fantasy accounts of miracles and angels and all that stuff. We can know little if anything of the real Jesus from the Bible, and obviously the accounts of his death and resurrection are mostly if not totally made up by sincerely but ignorant followers who wrote them many years after the fact, and perhaps there is Paul who may have seen the early church as a way to make a name for himself or what not. While the Bible is of course respected and revered (in the same way a wife-beating husband may claim to love his wife), there is no compulsion to follow it's obviously barbaric dictates by those who have progressed beyond such things.

And so, the Word of God is merely...there. If anything, they seem to take far more time trying to explain it way than anything else. And in the end, one can see that their ethics and morality and almost completely contrary to anything in the Bible.

That is the door McLaren opens with this idea, back in 2001. And does anyone care to deny that emergents have walked through that door, and are becoming more like the liberals referenced above?

This attempt to artificially separate the authority of the Word of God from the authority of God is not good, and in the end doesn't make sense. Imagine, for example, a king issuing a decree. The words of the king in the decree have authority, because the king has authority. It would not do to say that while the king yes has authority, the words of the king are really not so authoritative.

And if that could be said of merely human king, how much more for the One who is King of all Kings? To say that He has authority, but to say that His Word does not, is a tricky bit of sophistry that will not work, but will only undermine the idea of God's authority.

he should stop trying so hard

A sojo writer is again trying too hard, trying to read too much into modern-day things and the Bible to make his liberal point.

He tries to use the account in the book of Ruth as a way to bludgeon the US, particularly conservatives, and it just won't work.

What if the Bible’s Ruth Came to America Today?

In the biblical story, Ruth was a foreigner from the nation of Moab, which was despised by all patriotic and God-fearing Israelites. Yet when she came to Israel as a widow, companion to her widowed mother-in-law, Naomi, she was welcomed onto the fields of Boaz, where she gleaned what the regular harvesters had left behind. Boaz made sure that even this despised foreigner had a decent job at decent pay. When she went one night to the barn where the barley crop was being threshed, he spent the night with her — and decided to marry her.

First, I will say that the most distasteful thing here is the insinuation (which is repeated later and more clearly) that the time Esther met with Boaz on the threshing floor was a sexual encounter between the two of them.

When she boldly “uncovers the feet” of Boaz during the night they spend together on the threshing floor, has she violated the “family values” that some religious folk now proclaim? Or has she affirmed that love engages the body as well as the heart, the mind, and the spirit, and that sometimes a loving body comes before a wedding?

The Bible does not say that, and for this writer to say that reveals his agenda. He is clearly insinuating that moral bounds have no place where "love" is concerned--in other words, that sex outside of marriage is ok so long as the two "love" each other (one may also wonder if he is working in the "love" argument of the homo/trans/whateversexuals, too.)

In the biblical story, Ruth was a foreigner from the nation of Moab, which was despised by all patriotic and God-fearing Israelites. Yet when she came to Israel as a widow, companion to her widowed mother-in-law, Naomi, she was welcomed onto the fields of Boaz, where she gleaned what the regular harvesters had left behind. Boaz made sure that even this despised foreigner had a decent job at decent pay. When she went one night to the barn where the barley crop was being threshed, he spent the night with her — and decided to marry her.

Here is a bit, from the biblical account.

1 Now Naomi had a relative on her husband's side, from the clan of Elimelech, a man of standing, whose name was Boaz.
2 And Ruth the Moabitess said to Naomi, "Let me go to the fields and pick up the leftover grain behind anyone in whose eyes I find favor."
Naomi said to her, "Go ahead, my daughter."
3 So she went out and began to glean in the fields behind the harvesters. As it turned out, she found herself working in a field belonging to Boaz, who was from the clan of Elimelech.
4 Just then Boaz arrived from Bethlehem and greeted the harvesters, "The LORD be with you!"
"The LORD bless you!" they called back.
5 Boaz asked the foreman of his harvesters, "Whose young woman is that?"
6 The foreman replied, "She is the Moabitess who came back from Moab with Naomi.
7 She said, 'Please let me glean and gather among the sheaves behind the harvesters.' She went into the field and has worked steadily from morning till now, except for a short rest in the shelter."
8 So Boaz said to Ruth, "My daughter, listen to me. Don't go and glean in another field and don't go away from here. Stay here with my servant girls.
9 Watch the field where the men are harvesting, and follow along after the girls. I have told the men not to touch you. And whenever you are thirsty, go and get a drink from the water jars the men have filled."
10 At this, she bowed down with her face to the ground. She exclaimed, "Why have I found such favor in your eyes that you notice me—a foreigner?"
11 Boaz replied, "I've been told all about what you have done for your mother-in-law since the death of your husband—how you left your father and mother and your homeland and came to live with a people you did not know before.
12 May the LORD repay you for what you have done. May you be richly rewarded by the LORD, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have come to take refuge."

One wonders if this blogger would have approved of Boaz, if this were to happen today. After all, Boaz seems to have based his decision on allowing Ruth to continue gleaning on her character, not her status as poor/immigrant/foreign/whatever PC label may or may not fit. He knew of Ruth's support for Naomi, and of her leaving her home (and perhaps by extension her false gods) to come to Israel. I could as easily see this blogger saying Boaz was being discriminatory in his hiring, because he took her actions and character in account in his decision.

In ancient Israel, everyone had the right simply to walk onto a field and begin to work, begin to use the means of production of that era. And then to eat what they had gathered.

I would like to see what scripture he has in support of that position. Perhaps it's there, but he gives nothing for it here.

Here is a bit about the gleaning that Ruth did.

Levitcus 19
9 " 'When you reap the harvest of your land, do not reap to the very edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest. 10 Do not go over your vineyard a second time or pick up the grapes that have fallen. Leave them for the poor and the alien. I am the LORD your God.

Leviticus 23
22 " 'When you reap the harvest of your land, do not reap to the very edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest. Leave them for the poor and the alien. I am the LORD your God.' "

One thing that isn't in dispute in these passages is that the one who owned and worked or paid workers was entitled to the lion's share of the harvest, and even the first of it. And even with the gleaning, it was hardly a "wait for a check in the mail" type of thing--the poor people had to actually get out and do some work to get the food, not expect the government to do the work for them.

Parts of the blogger's entry are simply ridiculous, as he tries to vilify the US.

Would she be admitted at the border?
Or would she be detained for months without a lawyer, ripped from Naomi’s arms while Naomi’s protest brought her too under suspicion — detained because she was, after all, a Canaanite who spoke some variety of Arabic, possibly a terrorist, for sure an idolator?
Would she be deported as merely an “economic refugee,” not a worthy candidate for asylum?
Would she have to show a “green card” before she could get a job gleaning at any farm, restaurant, or hospital?
Would she be sent to “workfare” with no protections for her dignity, her freedom, or her health?
Would she face contempt because she and Naomi, traveling without a man, might be a lesbian couple?
Would she be waterboarded — drowned again and again, revived at the point of death to be drowned yet again — until she confessed that she had supplied a foreign enemy with mass-destruction weapons to attack America?

Perhaps he should go out into the real world, and see how immigrants are actually treated here, instead of relying on biased sources that have their own political leanings and agendas (though this man has them himself, so I doubt he's going to look hard to see contrary evidence, no matter how obvious it is). And his comments about waterboarding her can only be seen as a stretch, as that was done only to known terrorists.

This blogger's article is silly to the point of hilarious. Whatever point he's trying to make is lost in his biases and agendas and poor support for whatever scriptural claims he's trying to make (and, again, the fact that he's saying that premarital sex is ok only makes one wonder what other bad interpretations he's using).

This Sojo article is Total Fail.

honor

My family has a bit of military history. My father was in the military, as was my brother, as is one of my brothers-in-law. When I was in college, I attempted to join the ROTC, though I was not accepted.

Without shame, I have much respect and honor for those who serve honorably in our military. And none at all for those who seek to spread lies and defamations about them.

I grant the possibility of a person being a thoughtful and principled pacifist, but I've met few if any of them. My own view of most of those I've had any kind of contact with is that, they are the kinds of people who will gladly take the freedoms (freedoms of speech, assembly, the press, and so on) won for them by the sacrifices of warriors who fought to gain them, and use them to criticize and castigate the ones who have and are now defending those rights for them.

Someone else wrote a very good piece about Christians and the military. The writer, one Kevin DeYoung, says very well things that I think, too.

Why Memorial Day is Worth Remembering

1. Being a soldier is not a sub-Christian activity. In Luke 3, John the Baptist warns the people to bear fruit in keeping with repentance. The crowds respond favorably to his message and ask him, “What then shall we do?” John tells the rich man to share his tunics, the tax collectors to collect only what belongs to them, and the soldiers to stop their extortion. If ever there was a time to tell the soldiers that true repentance meant resigning from the army, surely this was the time. And yet, John does not tell them that they must give up soldier-work to bear fruit, only that they need to be honest soldiers. The Centurion is even held up by Jesus as the best example of faith he’s seen in Israel (Luke 7:9). Military service, when executed with integrity and in the Spirit of God, is a suitable vocation for the people of God.

5. This may be controversial to some, but I believe the facts of history will demonstrate that on the whole, the United States military has been a force for good in the world. Obviously, as a military power, we have blundered at times, both individually and corporately. But on the whole, the men and women of our armed services have fought and are fighting for causes that promote freedom, defend the rights of human beings, and reject tyranny. War is still hell and a tragic result of the fall. Praise God for his promise to one day end all human conflict. But in a world where people are evil by nature and leaders are not always reasonable and countries do not always have good intentions, war is sometimes the way to peace–at least the best peace we can hope for between peoples and nations this side of heaven.

There is more to it, and I hope you will read it. It is worth reading.

(oh, and you emergents (yes i know you're out there), maybe just maybe, in a faint whisper so none of your leftie pacifists friends can hear you (because we all know how ugly those peace-loving types get when you don't agree with them), maybe you'll want to show at least enough integrity to whisper a "thank you" to the soldiers who gave you the freedom to blog against them and what they do, ok? thanks)

the whole smorgasbord

First, a bit of a reminder, from the Ooze.

MYTH #6: You Must Believe Jesus Is the Son of God To Follow Him.

Because it may help to explain this.

FAITH HOUSE ADVISORY COUNCIL

So, from the monotheistic religions of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam (not mentioning the athiesm of humanism), we now have a practicing Hindu on their council.

Prediction--They'll soon be adding a Buddhist, too. Not long after that, a shaman. Or maybe the shaman will come first, but I suppose the Buddhist would more politic, since it is a major religion.

Because now the door is open to the polytheistic religions (though if Buddhism is nontheistic, and a humanist was already a part of it, then why has it taken so long to put a Buddhists in the mix?)

It would be almost amusing to watch, if it weren't sad. Some people will go to such great lengths to do things any way but God's way.

backwards

Like many people, I believe in the Bible because I believe in God. But I know plenty of people who think it ought to happen the other way around, that a person needs to believe the Bible in order to believe in God. So they'll give a Bible to a non-Christian in the hope that by reading about God, that person will be enlightened. Certainly that can happen, but it seems kind of backward to me. I mean, what possible reason would someone have for believing this story if they didn't already believe in God?
Doug Pagitt, A Christianity Worth Believing, p. 64

A bit ago, I saw a couple of accounts from this video.

More Than Dreams - DVD

The two I saw were the accounts of Khalil and Khosrow.

One thing of note in each of their accounts was that, for each of them, their starting point was the Bible--Khalil was given the assignment to study the Bible so as to prove it wrong, and Khosrow was given a New Testament when he visited a church.

Here is another site, with links to YouTube versions of the videos.

More Than Dreams: The Power of the Bible

Romans 10:17 (New International Version)
17Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ.

How could they have knows what to believe, had they not started with the Bible? These were men who already had faith in a god, what could have changed that except the Word of God?

filth

A few weeks ago, I made comment on what an emergent named Rollins said, that I could only call "Evil". This time, another emergent at The Ooze has come out with something that I can only call "Filth".

"PORNABLE," "PORNADY," AND DRAG IN REVELATION 17

I think for many of us we read the scriptures and pass over verses and sometimes whole chapters and not realize the explicit graphic sexual and violent content that is found within them. With the help of Queer Theory and a bit of Poststructrualist pizzazz, I seek to disrupt a normal reading of Revelation 17 as an attempt to bring about more dialogue and to help others to see the divinely inspired horror that lies within some of our sacred biblical passages.

First, a link to the "real" Revelation 17

Revelation 17

And now, what the Ooze writer has to say.

We have an interesting situation where this mysterious messenger with seven bowls in hand came to this supposed holy man named John. We are not sure if this messenger was a guy or a girl but whoever he or she was, he/she was perfect. I am not sure what was in the bowls but whatever it was sure smelled funny. This messenger strangely enough, wanted to take John of all people, to a sadistic porno of sorts starring an amazingly beautiful and alluring drag queen prostitute. Apparently John did not resist.

Little did John know that this kinky sexcapade would also involve some kind of animal or wild beast dressed in some sort of weird sex suit with some horns and heads sticking out of it with whom the fancifully dressed prostitute would ride like a wild cowgirl while she spewed nasty, degrading and blasphemous dirty talk at the poor animal.

compare that with the real thing.

1One of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and said to me, "Come, I will show you the punishment of the great prostitute, who sits on many waters. 2With her the kings of the earth committed adultery and the inhabitants of the earth were intoxicated with the wine of her adulteries."
3Then the angel carried me away in the Spirit into a desert. There I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast that was covered with blasphemous names and had seven heads and ten horns. 4The woman was dressed in purple and scarlet, and was glittering with gold, precious stones and pearls. She held a golden cup in her hand, filled with abominable things and the filth of her adulteries. 5This title was written on her forehead:
MYSTERY
BABYLON THE GREAT
THE MOTHER OF PROSTITUTES
AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.
6I saw that the woman was drunk with the blood of the saints, the blood of those who bore testimony to Jesus.

First, there is nothing pornographic about what the Bible really says here. It is a view of evil, yes, but there is no hint of what the emergent writer is trying to find it in.

Second, there is no hint in the biblical passage of the harlot spewing "nasty, degrading and blasphemous dirty talk at the poor animal". The biblical passage does, however, say "the woman was drunk with the blood of the saints, the blood of those who bore testimony to Jesus". If this emergent joker is trying to say that the beast the woman rode on is the church, than I would say that he or she has not clue on how to read.

This emergent's perversion of the biblical account of the vision given to John has to rank among the most vile things I've ever read.

is this a stretch?

I don't think so.

Ok, here's how it's gone...

Emergent Village recent had a blog entry that pimped for the ideas of Matthew Fox, among other things.

This Fox guy, proving that one can make a farce out of real dramatic history, wrote 95 Theses.

They can be found at Yes Magazine

This magazine has a Our Own Agenda :: 10 Policies For a Better America

Here's what they say...

Bring back the Fairness Doctrine and get broadcasters to open the people's airwaves to fee campaign information.

Translated: Do away with free speech.

btw How are radio stations the "people's airwaves"? And doesn't that rhetoric sound suspiciously like what communist leaders say to pull the wool over the eyes of those they want to put under their red thumbs?

Restore voting rights to ex-felons who have served their sentences.

Because there's not better pro-lib no-punishment constituency than ex-cons.

Increase minimum wage and worker protection for all, documented and undocumented.

So, we should should make sure the people here illegally get paid by a rate set by law? Does anyone else see the irony in that?

Adopt the Employee Free Choice Act to increase opportunities to unionize.

Translated: Make sure the union bullies get bully everyone with a not-secret ballot.

Provide everyone vacation and family leave.

Yeah, because we all need the law to make sure we get days off.

Provide gay and lesbian couples with the legal protections afforded to straight couples.

Yeah, sliding down the slippery slope of legalizing anything that involves sex.

There're other things there, too. It's pretty much a liberal screed.

And one can ask, and I think rightly, if this is another indication of the direction in which emergent is going.

And I think the answer is, quite resoundingly, "YES, IT IS!!!"

Which is why they are the ones who need to do the repenting.

doing injustice in the name of justice?

Two things define 'justice' in a biblical context.

First, there is no understanding without standing under.

Second, the question is not "What are you standing for?" but "Who are you standing with?"
Leonard Sweet, in a 'meditation' in the book "Justice in the Burbs" by Will and Lisa Samson, p. 94-95

Actually, I can't think of a more sure way to bring to about injustice than by saying it's about "Who are you standing with?"

First, is his claim true? Is this what the Bible teaches? Consider these passages.

Do not pervert justice; do not show partiality to the poor or favoritism to the great, but judge you neighbor fairly.
Leviticus 18:17

Do not follow the crowd in doing wrong. When you give testimony in a lawsuit, do not pervert justice by siding with the crowd,

and do not show favoritism to a poor man in his lawsuit.
Exodus 23:2-3

Do not show partiality in judging; hear both small and great alike.
Deuteronomy 1:17a

The Bible does say much about making sure the poor are treated justly, and that's understandable. It's the rich, after all, who are able to bribe and influence in order to have unjust decision made in their favor. Such is human nature.

But as can be seen in the passages above, the Bible most certainly does NOT say that justice is siding with the poor. The poor and the rich are both to be shown justice. It is no more right to favor the poor over the rich then it is to favor the rich over the poor.

So, I think Sweet is dead wrong in what he writes. Justice is about "What are you standing for?" Justice is about treating all justly, with no favoritism and no partiality.

And one can see how Sweet's ideas can only backfire--demonizing the rich as oppressors and exploiters without regards to whether a rich person is that way or not; enforcing taxation policies which are designed to punish those who work and succeed in gaining wealth while rewarding those who did not work for it; spreading poverty by taking away the incentive to better one's life through the reliance on a small but (theoretically) steady stream of welfare funds.

If you think I'm reaching in my logic, consider this.

Obama Sees Supreme Court Justices as Champions of the Weak Over the Strong
For Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, Supreme Court justices should champion the weak against the strong.

Obama outlined his views on justices in the speeches he gave on the Senate floor in opposition to the confirmations of Chief Justice John G. Roberts and Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr.

In both speeches, the Illinois Democrat chastised the nominees not for their positions on specific constitutional issues or matters of law but for what he perceived as too often siding with the strong instead of the weak. He chargied Roberts, for example, with being dismissive of claims of racial and gender discrimination and criticized Alito for making a habit out of siding with government and corporations against plaintiffs and workers.

These article is from last year, right before the US made the currently abyssmal decision to put this man into our highest office.

But for the sake of this discussion, focus on what he's saying--that the courts should favor the poor against the rich. How different that is from what the Bible really says, that neither poor nor rich should be favored.

Obama and Sweet are supporting injustice, pure and simple.

weighed and found wanting

Heal or heel?

While the Bible shows that God can heal people supernaturally, claims of particular faith-healers should be examined. Here’s what WORLD learned about the “Lakeland Outpouring” healings of television preacher Todd Bentley

This whole article is an indictment against those in WoF and apostolic/prophetic movement that try to make much over someone who claims to have "power" or "the anointing" or "the power of God" or whatever they wish to call it.

It's pathetic that these so-called prophets and apostles and healers can be so easily duped, and do nothing or next-to-nothing, and even endorse, when these charlatans come along, draw bigs crowds, draw in big bucks, put on a big show, make a loud noise, and claim big things while not deliving much of anything.

At the height of what many called a revival, WORLD asked Bentley to talk about the healings, like Fogle's, and asked for a list of people who had been healed at the services. His associates told me Bentley was out of the country and a list could not be produced. But six weeks and more than a dozen requests later, the ministry eventually sent a list of 13 names. Fogle was No. 12 on the list, along with this note: "Healed through the Outpouring and is back to fishing."

That was on Aug. 8, 2008. There was just one problem. Two weeks earlier, on July 22, Christopher A. Fogle—according to his obituary in the Keokuk (Iowa) Daily Gate City, "left this life . . . after a courageous battle with cancer."

When contacted, Ansley confirmed that she had attended the Lakeland Outpouring for about a week, and she confirmed that she did ask for prayer for an old skiing accident. She said that after the prayers the knee "was not as stiff" as it had been. As for the migraines: "I still have migraines," she said.

And then there's this person, who gives a whole other meaning to what some may mean when they say they have been 'healed'.

Not only did any healing take place elsewhere, Smith now admits that the scans are not now clear. "The doctors tell me that my numbers are going up," said Smith, who told me that she, too, had a healing ministry. "But we don't buy into that. That's a fact, but it's not the truth. The truth is that I've been healed."

Not sure where the Bible says that we should stick our fingers in our ears and ignore when told bad news about our health. Must have missed that somewhere.

Anyway, this article highlights one of my frustrations with charismatics. I'm someone who believes that the gifts are still for today, which is one reason I'm not a very good Baptist. At the same time, it seems that most charismatics are going off-the-deep-end with regards to legitimzing anything that has 'manifestations' and uses the right lingo.

Charismatics need to stop letting these fakers get away with it. More than that, they need to stop letting their apostolic/prophetic "leaders" get away with letting this kind of thing go on, let alone legitmizing it. Which means they need to stop just taking the words of these apostles and prophets without discernment, but to weigh what they are saying by the Bible and see if it's really so. And if these apostles and prophets get their undies in a knot over that, well, that probably answers the question very well.

an athiest gets it

As an atheist, I truly believe Africa needs God

The whole article is a fascinating read, and I recommend it. My main focus here has to do with these words of his.

Anxiety - fear of evil spirits, of ancestors, of nature and the wild, of a tribal hierarchy, of quite everyday things - strikes deep into the whole structure of rural African thought. Every man has his place and, call it fear or respect, a great weight grinds down the individual spirit, stunting curiosity. People won't take the initiative, won't take things into their own hands or on their own shoulders.

Christianity, post-Reformation and post-Luther, with its teaching of a direct, personal, two-way link between the individual and God, unmediated by the collective, and unsubordinate to any other human being, smashes straight through the philosphical/spiritual framework I've just described. It offers something to hold on to to those anxious to cast off a crushing tribal groupthink. That is why and how it liberates.

Those who want Africa to walk tall amid 21st-century global competition must not kid themselves that providing the material means or even the know-how that accompanies what we call development will make the change. A whole belief system must first be supplanted.

In my reading of emergents, one of the bogeymen they often come out against is individualism. They question of concept of God saving individuals, and stress instead concepts of community and group-think. One of their 'churches' even has the congregation help in making it's services.

But this athiest sees the truth, that Christian individualism is a good thing.

Rather, this now holistic trend emergents are so hyped on is nothing more than a new form of conformity and servitude, where the group decides, and please check your brain at the door lest your opinions not be conducive to the conversation, and state are opinions in the form of a question, and please don't expect an answer. We will tell you how to think, after you're sufficiently conditioned by our mystical disciplines to be open to acceptance without question.

And you will do as we say, or else your loving and caring emergent cohorts will sorrowfully kick you out and call you a Modernist or Fundamentalist or some such thing and say that you were ruining the conversation and not giving off good vibrations or some such thing.

Yeah, something like that.

Sad, when the committed athiest sees things the uncommitted good-as-athiests don't.