Mulled Vine

I don’t normally read self-improvement books, apart from the Bible that is, which by the way I can highly recommend – its a best seller! But I digress. Last year I read one of Stephen Covey’s “Seven Habits” books. Its an excellent book, full of thoroughly Christian principles.

The most memorable of these is this one:

Seek first to understand, then to be understood.

This line is worth reflecting on and stapling to your heart so you don’t forget it. Its not just a guiding principle for communicating, but for relating to people in general. We are so quick to judge and inflict our views on others, without first understanding fully where people are coming from.

For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.” (Rom 8:15)

Going a little farther, he [Jesus] fell to the ground and prayed that if possible the hour might pass from him. “Abba, Father,” he said, “everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.” (Mk 14:35-36)

I have been told in the past that Abba meant Daddy, but Wikipedia tells me “It is a common misconception and popular anecdote that abba meant “Daddy” in Aramaic, but there are no historical sources that testify to this.”

I’m quite glad I found the Wikipedia bit because this morning’s Bible reading reminded me that our modern, matey view of fatherhood with respect to our Heavenly Father may be wholly inappropriate.

Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, for our “God is a consuming fire.” (Heb 12:28)

Our Father in Heaven, Hallowed be Thy name!

Just when I thought I had enough questions, here is another.

King’s Kid posted the following link on The Bible Thumper’s Soapbox – the article is a scathing attack on the NIV version!

Here’s a snippet:

The holder of the Copyright to the New International Version Bible (NIV) also holds the copyright for porn magazine entitled “Hustler”. A Mr. Rupert Murdock, called “Media’s prince of Darkness” by Chicago columnist Mike Royco. Mr. Murdock owns, not only the copyright & exclusive printing rights to the NIV, he also owns the copyright on another corrupt Bible, the Amplified Version. Both are through Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids Michigan, which I might add, he owns as well.

I’ve been using the NIV for 20 years, now and then dipping into other versions for a different perspective on verses. I thought it was a good translation that uses more reliable manuscripts and have largely dismissed the KJV because of its archaic language. Not so sure any more.

Is the KJV the ONLY appropriate translation?

One for my list I guess. Sigh.

Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves. Do you not realize that Christ Jesus is in you—unless, of course, you fail the test? (2 Cor 13:5)

Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. (Heb 11:1)

Reading Hebrews 11 this morning, that great chapter on Faith, I was reminded once again how much people have been willing to sacrifice for their faith, and how little faith I have.

So many questions, so many struggles, so few answers, so much hope, so much uncertainty. And I wonder, do I have any faith at all?

Faith is being sure of what we hope for.

I’m not sure of much. With me its all probabilities. This and that may be true but its hard to be dogmatic about it. I envy people who can say without a shadow of a doubt: “This is true”. How can they be so sure??

Is it ok to be like this? Is this faith?

Not, it seems, if you read Hebrews 11. These people were sure.

But were they sure about everything?

One of my favourite verses in the Bible is the at the end of this passage in John 6.

On hearing it, many of his disciples said, “This is a hard teaching. Who can accept it?”
Aware that his disciples were grumbling about this, Jesus said to them, “Does this offend you? What if you see the Son of Man ascend to where he was before! The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life. Yet there are some of you who do not believe.” For Jesus had known from the beginning which of them did not believe and who would betray him. He went on to say, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless the Father has enabled him.”
From this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him.
“You do not want to leave too, do you?” Jesus asked the Twelve.
Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.”

Its like that with me. As much as I struggle with the bigger questions, Jesus’ words have blown me away and fundamentally changed my life. Where else am I going to go? His words are a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. Nothing else makes any sense to me whatsoever.

I have been mulling over a recent comment on this blog
“… the point is that every truth is always contextual and always under contestation. It means that you can only know the truth you know – as a human, at this point in history, etc. It doesn’t mean to suggest that there are no truths, but that we (as limited human beings) should have a little less hubris – especially when were using it to hurt others…”

If you, like me, have to look up hubris, then I’ll save you the trouble – it means excessive pride or self-confidence; arrogance.

Now I agree totally that we should approach conversations about the truth with humility, in the knowledge that we are possibly wrong, but is every truth “always under contestation”?

I’m typing on my laptop. I know its a laptop. If I leaned over to my colleague and asked him if this was a laptop I know what he’d say (once he was done laughing). That is an uncontestable truth.

So NOT always. Hah!

Then I remembered my new word hubris and mulled further.

Why is it an uncontestable truth?

I think its a laptop and am pretty confident about that. My senses tell me this thing under my fingers exists and is just like other things I have perceived before called laptops. Sometimes my perceptions have been confirmed by others calling it a laptop.

So something is very likely to be true if (i) I perceive it with my senses, and (ii) this perception has independent, trustworthy confirmation.

But sometimes something is also very likely to be true without my personal perception being required. For example, my wife tells me she spent £200 at the shops. She is trustworthy so I believe her, much as I’d like not to in this case. I also apply a reasonableness check – she’s spent this sort of amount before at the shops, so she’s not just trying to wind me up. (Note: this is a completely made up example!)

I say very likely rather than uncontestable because the fact is that my senses and my trustworthy truth confirmers may let me down. So always I need to apply a reasonableness check. If my wife suddenly starts seeing live pink rabbits then I need to question her trustworthiness in this instance because I have never experienced live pink rabbits before. But if my daughters confirmed her statement then I would have to reevaluate.

Ok, so the principle seems to be that if many people I trust say something happened, then even if I didn’t experience it myself, and it seems a bit unlikely, then I should believe it. And its a very likely truth (almost to the point of being uncontestable) because I really trust them – they are my family.

So what about the alleged truths in the Bible?

The principle is the same. For example, I believe Jesus lived and did some fairly unlikely stuff because there were many documented witnesses to this fact. Are they trustworthy? This is a big discussion but let me offer some thoughts:

• a witness is likely to be telling the truth about his perception of events if he’s willing to die for his testimony
• a witness who’s whole worldview is about truth and honesty is not likely to be lying
• a witness who appears to be very sane and competent in other respects is not likely to be deluded
• if multiple witnesses describe an account and there are subtle variations in the accounts which can be reconciled, then its likely that the account was not concocted
• if a witness makes statements which agree with other witnesses spanning hundreds of years and cultures then its likely to be true

So, assuming that I have an accurate representation of what the witnesses said (another topic in itself) and that I apply common-sense interpretation principles to what was written, I think its reasonable to really trust these witnesses, making what they say very likely, almost to the point of being uncontestable.

But its still only almost, so watch out for that hubris.

I have just read a post that has really convicted me. I realise that I have in recent years become agnostic towards the Truth. I have started to believe that God’s Word, whilst containing the Truth, is open to wide interpretation and have even found myself thinking (in classic Post Modernist fashion) that all interpretations are equally valid.

But is this the case?

All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. (2 Tim 3:16-17 – a verse that I have memorised in the past!?)

How can ALL Scripture be useful if ALL Scripture can’t be rightly understood and have one readily identifiable meaning?

But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, and how from infancy you have known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. (2 Tim 3:14-15)

Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth. (2 Tim 2:15)

Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. (John 8:31-32)

If we don’t have a solid grounding in the truth we will be like “infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming.” (Eph 4:14)

Father, forgive me for becoming discouraged and apathetic at the divisions and lack of unity in your Church, and the seeming inability to find absolute Truth in your Word. I have lost my way. But your word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path so I turn from disillusionment and seek your face. Give me ears to hear and eyes to see.

Father I pray that your children will no longer be like infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming. I pray that instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ.

I have been given an award. Moi? Has the world gone mad?

And it gets even worse…. TWO people have independently given me this award!!

To quote:
“Its a brand new award being passed out. It is the “Mathetes Award”, created by Dan King of Management by God to recognize those who take to heart the Great Commission and further God’s Kingdom by creating more disciples for Him. According to Dan mathetes is the Greek word for disciple. The rules for the award, as posted by it’s creator are as follows:

In the spirit of this award, the rules are simple. Winners of this award must pick five other “disciples” to pass it on to. As you pass it on, I just ask that you mention and provide links for (1)this post as the originator of the award (Dan King of management by God), (2) the person that awarded it to you, and then (3) name and sites of the five that you believe are fulfilling the role of a disciple of Christ.”

I honestly don’t know what to say, and I’d like to dedicate this award to my Mom, my cat Fluffy, … No, seriously, THANK YOU.

Now I have a problem. The instructions are to pass it on to five other deserving “disciples”, but four that immediately spring to mind have already received it and I don’t think I know that many others well enough to pass on the award to.

Sure I could just pick 5 people at random, but then its a meaningless award. It occurrs to me that the award cannot go on being passed on forever. This would mean that everybody gets it eventually, which is obviously silly and this award is would then be no better than a chain mail.

The people I wanted to send the award to are:
Proverbs31WomanWannaBe
Belt of Truth Ministries
AsTheCrackerheadCrumbles
Joie De Vivre

But after some reflection it turns out there are quite a number of deserving blogs out there still, so …

I award the Mathetes Award to (in no particular order)
Casey’s Critical Thinking
Christian Think Tank
ThirstyJon
Sailing by Starlight
Good Christian Life

I came to Christianity late in life, and was raised with hardly any exposure to religion. My conversion at the tender age of 20 was into a fundamentalist group that believed they had The Biblical Truth and that if you disagreed you were very likely not saved. We studied the Bible many times a week and were proud of our back-to-the-Bible church model. We were like the Bereans (Acts 17:11) and proud of it. We had ditched the traditions of men for the Word. We were not a denomination – we were the church of Christ!

I embraced this certainty wholeheartedly until I moved abroad and into deep water. Not only did my fundamentalist group not have much representation in the UK, but those groups that did lacked the commitment of my former group. I became disillusioned and wandered in the wilderness for a while before my dear long-suffering wife managed to persuade me to go to a local free Evangelical church.

Now I’d never knowingly met an Evangelical before and boy was I in for a surprise. These people seemed like Christians yet had a different set of “truths” to mine!? I ignored this for a while until we settled down in the Baptist church we now fellowship with, but then I had to sort this out. After all, was I not like the Bereans?

The first thing I discovered was that there is a wealth of very strong opinion out there on what “The Truth” is, much of it supported by hoardes of favourite scriptures.

Then I discovered that my Baptist church had a different view of my precious regenerative baptism (baptizo in the Greek, which means immersion, none of this sprinkling nonsense – see we were taught well) – they viewed it as not regenerative, but symbolic! I looked into it in earnest, and well, they perhaps have a point. I was becoming uncertain that I still had “The Truth”.

Then I discovered that I was an Arminian without knowing it, that there was something called Calvinism, and Original Sin, that perhaps I might be lost before I’d even started sinning, that God may have elected us, given us grace to choose and so on. I learnt about eternal security.

Naturally I challenged all of this, like a good Berean should, but when you’re on your own, and your brain is not that big, and you don’t have the benefit of extensive studies in things like hermeneutics, it becomes quite tough to work out what’s what.

So why have I bared my soul like this, laid myself wide open to all sorts of “loving correction” (abuse) from those of you who know the Truth?

Its because I need to ask you. How can you say you know “The Truth”? It doesn’t seem that clear to me. Denominations don’t just exist because we are deceived and relying on the traditions of men rather than The Word. Is it because there is perhaps some genuine (and acceptable) ambiguity in the Bible that we in our human arrogance have decided to make an issue of, beating each other up with what amounts to little more than strong opinions? We gather in our little groups of like-minded bigots and look down our noses at each other because we know the truth and they are misguided fools. Of course we love them, because we “Speak the Truth in Love”, but we know better, we are better, we are like the Bereans.

Rubbish.

“My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one: I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.“

I believe God to be loving and just, but I must confess that I struggle to reconcile these attributes with the concept of an eternal, fiery hell where unbelievers will be punished. He gives us choice, but punishes us forever if we fail to choose Him? What kind of choice is that?

Its a very common struggle, so much so that even Wikipedia has a reference. One of my favourite websites Christian Thinktank has much to say on this subject but it can be quite heavy going some times, so I thought I’d mull this over myself.

The first thing to say is that the objection can not be to the fact that punishment occurs. It is within our concept of fairness to expect misdeeds to be punished. The objection is that the punishment seems to be excessive: we commit a finite amount of sin, so how can we receive infinite punishment in return? An answer to this is that we are dealing with an infinitely holy God, and so the offenses against Him are infinitely bad and hence worthy of infinite punishment.

Others have argued that hell is not as bad as we think, that unbelievers are destroyed forever in hell and that only believers are granted everlasting life. In other words, eternal punishment rather than eternal punishing. This is called Annihilationism and is very appealing from a moral point of view since death is viewed as a more just punishment than eternal “torture”. I have not looked into this in great detail yet but my initial impression is that its attempting to view and hence distort Scripture in the light of an assumption. Having said that, it has some prominent advocates such as John Stott…. so don’t take my word for it.

Another view is that hell is not really fiery pit, that this is just imagery, something the Bible is full of. Hell is instead a place of our own making. We reject God and He honours that choice by removing Himself and those who choose Him for all eternity. What’s left is a place the wicked have chosen, a place of pure unrestrained evil, without any love or compassion. Can you imagine such a place?

The other side of this objection is the question of choice. God has given us choice and most of us would agree I think that this a great thing and says much about the loving nature of our God. He also has made a way for the lost to find their way back to Him, and died in our stead in order to fulfil the requirements of justice. More loving nature in evidence. The problem however is that we have not all been given an equal starting point or opportunity to choose. Our genes and our environment distort our ability to choose. Not everyone is given equal access to the Gospel – some will never hear it, others will only hear an incomprehensible distortion of it. And let’s not even start to talk about what’s going on when the Bible speaks of election, i.e. God choosing us rather than the other way around! All seems terribly unfair.

Unfair? This is based on the assumption that we are all deserving of equal opportunity to choose. Is this a reasonable expectation? Is it fair that some of us are born smart and others not, some wealthy others poor, some with more talents than others? The parable of the labourers in the vineyard and the parable of the talents provide interesting insights into God’s mind. God gives the same reward to those who have laboured all day as to those who only laboured an hour. God gives us all different talents. God chooses some for noble purpose others not. Perhaps He may even choose some for salvation? Have we a right to object? May the creation say to the Creator “Why have you made me thus?”

Job 38

“Then the LORD answered Job out of the storm. He said: “Who is this that darkens my counsel with words without knowledge? Brace yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer me. Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation? …”

Worth reading in full before you carry on shaking your finger at your Maker.

Introduction

If God is good and all powerful, then why is there suffering? Surely it means that either God cannot be good or He cannot be all powerful? This riddle, first credited to the Greek philosopher Epicurus, troubles both unbelievers and believers alike. So what are we as believers to make of this, particularly when we ourselves are suffering? And furthermore, what apologetic are we to offer to those who question our faith?
Let’s consider some of the causes of suffering.

Freewill

We live in a battlefield of our own making. God has given us freewill, and as a consequence we live in a world that is affected by our choices, both good and bad. Genesis 3:17 also speaks of God “cursing the ground” because of man’s sin. So it would seem that the creation that God saw as being “good”, is no longer so. Satan too, by virtue of the same freewill is allowed to roam the earth like a roaring lion, but notice that his actions are restricted by God (Job 1:12 “but on the man himself do not lay a finger”). So God’s decision to allow his creatures freewill has led to suffering as men have abused that freewill to do great harm to each other. But what was the alternative? Without freewill we become no better than robots, incapable of independent thought and action, incapable of doing evil but also incapable of love. “Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’” (Romans 9:20).

Natural causes

The natural order of things sometimes causes harm. The same gravity that keeps us from flying from the earth will cause someone to fall to their death from a cliff. The same pain that causes us to remove our hand from a flame will cause us agony in other situations. God could intervene on a case by case basis, but what sort of nonsense world would that yield?

God’s judgement

Suffering in some instances is as a consequence of God’s judgement here on earth (Acts 5 – Ananias and Saphira). God is good, and this means that He cannot by his nature tolerate evil. We have “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23) so we all deserve God’s judgement. The fact that he usually does not judge us now on earth but gives us grace points more to the fact that He is loving and merciful, than that He is wrathful.

God’s work in us

Suffering very often works for our good. The world speaks of it being “character building”. The Bible states: “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose” (Romans 8:28). “God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness” (Hebrews 12:10) “For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for him” (Philippians 1:29)

Conclusion

So it would seem that there is some sense to suffering, but even when all of the above has been taken into account, we will encounter situations that are incomprehensible, and we cry out “Why?” In these darkest times, God promises to be near to us if we’ll let him. After all, who is better able to understand our suffering than He who died for us on the cruel cross?