Christians and political involvement

It is true that as Christians it's our job to pray for those in authority. As Schaeffer might say, that's true truth, but it's not exhaustive truth - it's not the whole story.

For a start, who is "in authority" in our country? Is it the ruling party? What became apparent over the last few months is that hitherto, it has actually been the whole political system. The government, which doesn't just consist of the Conservatives, but also the civil service, exists (or existed) under the authority of parliament, the judiciary and the crown. When the governing party doesn't have a majority, that's not some mistaken fault in the system, that IS the system - it is how the system limits the power of a party that does not have a mandate from the electorate. Rather than pursuing policies that are divisive and don't have universal support, a party in that situation should be constrained to policies which command cross-party support. This system of government is what is in authority over us, and what we should be praying for - not just Johnson, not just the Conservatives, but for the whole structure that has been put in place by God for our good, of which this incarnation of the Conservative and Unionist Party is no more than a passing note.

One of my concerns about the Johnson regime is the way in which this structure was treated by him and his regime. Rees-Mogg lied to the queen - despised the crown - regarding the prorogation of parliament, the party sought to curtail parliamentary oversight, Johnson said the supreme court ruling was wrong. On multiple occasions, the Conservative party used executive authority to override the mechanisms of the state, specifically to prevent damage to itself (by suppressing reports which government mechanisms had produced). In other words, the Conservative party has sought to overturn every major component of our system of government, to guarantee their own authority. This was also included in their manifesto, and is what they are setting about now, in "reforming" the civil service, and with their plans to make high court judges political appointees. This is not democracy, this is not the authority of the system: it's the opposite, the usurping of that authority.

So what should we do? Who or what should we be praying for? I genuinely believe that in supporting the Conservative party as the ruling party, we are actually supporting a party which is seeking to overturn our government. The argument that we should not oppose those in authority, but pray for them, to my mind misunderstands the nature of authority and the rule of law in this country. It is not political parties that rule over us, it's the political and democratic system which has been established over centuries. The Conservatives are bent on scrapping this.

In a democracy, we have the right - in fact, as members of the electorate, the responsibility - to do something about this. We can oppose those who usurp power and corruption with our votes, with our legitimate protests, with commentary, in addition to praying for those in authority. We do not (yet) live in the regime of absolute power that Christians in the Roman empire did. In addition to volunteering for foodbanks (as Justin Welby suggests) it is legitimate to call out government policies which are resulting in poverty. In addition to supporting the homeless, we can point to what can be done to reduce homelessness. As Christians, we should not simply be socially and politically concerned, but we should not be less than socially and politically concerned.

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Who owns sermons?

When someone preaches in a church, who owns the sermon, from a copyright point of view?

It's a more complex question than you might think. Technically, as the person who delivers the sermon, the preacher owns it. And yet, the church is likely to fairly freely make use of it - put recordings on websites, distribute copies of sermon notes, possibly use extracts in various contexts. And also the church has probably paid the speaker to speak. What rights has that bought? Normally it's not a big deal - the preacher and the church exist in a relationship with one another: the church promotes and uses the preacher's teaching material; the preacher is supported by the church. As an example of the lack of clarity about this which exists, in one church I visit, I kind of discovered that although there was no apparent microphone, my talks were being recorded to listen to later. I wasn't particularly bothered, though.

But there are some circumstances when it may become more of an issue. For example, what if the church wants to use the sermons in another context - perhaps for radio broadcasts, or for publication in a book. Who decides? If royalties are generated, who should get them? Or supposing there is a breakdown in the relationship between church and preacher? This article in Christianity Today discusses the issue. It suggests that the most natural approach is probably to consider that the copyright is owned by the speaker, but he in effect grants the church a royalty-free licence to use his written or recorded material.

What does this mean? It means that the church can basically get on and use the material as they would normally do, and the speaker would implicitly accept that. But the speaker still has control if the church were to decide that it was worth doing something different with the material.

I am involved with a Christian conference, and this raises another bunch of complications. Again, it's reasonable for the conference to use messages from speakers as though this royalty-free licence exists. But since the conference organisation exists in effect as a group of people who make up an ad hoc committee once a year, plus people who work on particular tasks pretty much on their own, how do we decide - or rather, who decides - what use the conference can reasonably make of material that's produced? To what extent should we be telling the speaker exactly how their sermon is to be used? Ideas on a postcard, please ....

Christians and sex

A couple of quick warnings. Firstly, please note that this post is about sexual matters. I hope that the content proves useful, particularly to Christian parents who need to talk clearly with their children about sex, but I would encourage mature Christians to read and think about this, and make sure that they understand it themselves, prior to simply pointing anybody else to it.

Also, this is a long article (over 2000 words). I suggest you print it out to read rather than trying to wade through it on screen. If it is of any use to you, I can send it to you as a PDF file - add a comment, and I can pick up your email address from there.

Christians are reluctant to talk about sex. I can suggest various possible reasons for this. One is embarrassment - there are too many "naughty words" that we feel should be omitted from polite discourse. One is a dualistic hangover that many of us still feel, namely that the physical is dirty and bad, and it's only the spiritual that can be good. One is the fact that it stirs up strong feelings and we are perhaps a little worried about them.

The effect of this is that Christians often offer nothing of substance to discussion about sex. This isn't a good thing. We are generally bad enough at understanding the impact of worldviews in any case, even when we are able to make the case for the Christian worldview. But when it comes to sex, the worldview of the surrounding culture is left to dominate, with Christians rarely seeming to say anything more constructive than "Do not taste, do not touch" - as though sex is simply a matter of rules that we have to adhere to. So this post is an attempt to redress this balance somewhat.

What happens when we start from a basically materialistic, darwinian worldview - the one that dominates intellectual discourse today? We deduce that we are fundamentally biological (and thus chemical, and thus physical) entities, and everything we see is of necessity derived from this. In this context, reproduction is - well, not the highest good, because "good" implies a value system which is ultimately absent when physics is all there is - but certainly the fundamental necessity in biological terms.

This would explain why our sex drive is so powerful. However, at this point, the explanatory power of materialism ceases to be helpful. As in so many other areas, materialism and darwinism aren't so much scientific theories as means of accounting for any observation - a worldview which is used to interpret phenomena.

At one end of the spectrum, if physics is all that there is, ultimately, then it really isn't possible to say much more in consideration of sex than "this is what happens". Objects with mass attract one another. Space is curved. De Sade felt that it was legitimate for the stronger person to dominate the weaker. Certain people abuse children and have a desire to rape. If physics is ultimately all that there is, then all of these are ultimately just observations about the universe, and disapproving of sexual "deviancy" is a bit like disapproving of gravity. Even when such people harm others, do we have any real basis for saying that this shouldn't happen?

Few people accept this, of course, although it is hard to see how to find fault with it intellectually. From a materialistic point of view, morality is usually defined in terms of sociological acceptability, with sociology being some kind of emergent property at the level of the species. Note that individual morality can't really provide much guidance - because if somebody else has a different morality, then how do we choose between mine and theirs? But sociologically, perhaps, "morality is a herd instinct". If this is the case, then sanctions can be applied by the "herd" to constrain the behaviour of individuals within appropriate boundaries. And this is pretty much where we are at. Although society generally accepts and enforces certain limits, it means that there are no absolute standards of morality, in sexual terms. A hundred years ago, it was considered morally correct that sex ought to be confined to heterosexual marriage (however widespread deviation from this actually was). Now things are different. It is assumed that people in the west will be sexually active before forming a permanent or semi-permanent relationship; that it is better for people to live together before they marry; that sexual fidelity is no more than an arbitrary choice. The change in the sociological landscape itself justifies the changes in behaviour.

Bear in mind that the dominance of the materialistic worldview is a relatively recent (last 30 years or so) phenomenon. During this time, the fact that we have a biologically strong sex drive has led to the general acceptance that fulfilment of that drive is pretty much a biological necessity. So over the course of that time, we have seen (for example) increasing acceptance of pornography and prostitution, and the increasing acceptance of homosexuality within mainstream culture.

But even accepting the consensus of the materialistic culture up to this point, it now breaks down. The analysis that a male within the culture might make (if - and it is often a big if! - he were able to string together the ideas sufficiently coherently to express them!) would be to say that the biological sex drive finds its release in the orgasm. This justifies the acceptance of pornography and prostitution, and sex before and outside marriage in general. These things don't hurt anybody, it is argued, therefore there is no reason for them to be considered immoral.

However, many women would increasingly reject this analysis. Female dissatisfaction with the limitations of sex - even within the boundaries of a materialistic worldview - can be found throughout the culture - in popular shows like Sex and the City, in the feminist rejection of patriarchal models of sexuality, and on an everyday level with the fact that following the liberation(!) of the sexual revolution, men walk away from sexual relationships far more easily than they used to, with far less guilt, leaving women to deal with the consequences - emotional, psychological and physical. Perhaps the biological foundation for this is that women are designed to nurture children, and seek a stable relationship with a male who can provide for them whilst they are caring for the child. But the point is that the materialistic metanarrative has not managed to establish a coherent justification for a new pattern of sexual behaviour, and over the last 15 years it has arguably ended up looking less likely to do so. Whereas the consensus about "right" and "wrong" prior to the sexual revolution provided a framework for a society which had largely functioned in a stable manner for thousands of years, I would suggest that the widespread acceptance of a materialistic and sociological consensus about sexual relationships has largely led to the breakdown of social structures, and has also had a negative impact on individuals' sense of identity.

Another challenge to the materialistic approach to sex comes from the fact that such a large proportion of sexual activity (using the term in its widest sense) is not and has never been related to procreation. And given that the explosion in all sorts of sexual activity following the rise of materialism and the sexual revolution has not led to a population explosion, it can't be seriously suggested that sex, and the sociologically permitted changes in sex that we have seen, are fundamentally about strengthening the relationship between partners for the purpose of rearing children. Therefore, it seems reasonable to cast doubt on the original premise - namely, that sex is about the biological drive to reproduce.

So although people accept the materialistic idea that sex is the biological imperative, we find that we have moved away from any shared concept of how this ought to be expressed, and the phenomena we observe doesn't really seem to be consistent with the idea anyway. So the evidence suggests that the worldview may not be correct.

What is the Christian alternative? Firstly, sex has to be moved away from being the central item in the discussion. Christianity argues that although humans are animals (and therefore have a biological nature), there is more to them than this - there is a fundamental difference between humans and the rest of the animal kingdom, which Christianity talks about as being the image of God. Whereas sex might be considered the biological driving force throughout the natural world, it isn't for humans.

Even this assertion starts to show Christianity as being different from some highly pervasive materialistic ideas. It allows the possibility, for example, that aesthetic sense isn't solely on some level about sexual arousal. It suggests that creativity isn't fundamentally about attracting a mate. It permits the possibility of a desire for knowledge which isn't just about passing genes onto the next generation. These are helpful steps forward, as explanations of these phenomena which reduce them to outworkings of our sex drive were never really convincing.

I would suggest that relationships are a fundamental part of our identity as humans, and this is different from animals - it is part of the image of God. Incidentally, this assertion also means that the worldview which I am talking about is distinctively Christian (in which relationships exist within the divine nature, as a consequence of the Trinity) rather than any other monotheistic worldview. Inherent in the idea of relationships is the idea of love. There are different Bible words which are translated as love, but the focus should be on what they have in common, rather than their differences. Love, in Christian terms, is about giving myself for the other person. This is most completely expressed in the love that Christ had for his people, which resulted in him laying down his life for them ("Greater love has no man than this ..."). But we can see that this is the key component of love in all sorts of relationships - a parent's sacrifice of their own time and money for the sake of their children; a child's love for its parents expressed in the acceptance of the parents' authority over their life; the love for a friend which sacrifices time and care for them. Of course, the nature of love is that sacrifices don't feel like anything of the sort - but from the perspective of the observer, it can be seen that a person is giving up something of their own for the sake of another.

The example of Christ and the church is an important one, as the Bible talks about this being the prototypical marriage relationship. Christ gave up heaven, privilege and ultimately his very life for the sake of his people. Within the institution of marriage is the idea that husbands should give themselves up for the sake of their wives ("Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church..."), and that wives should be as devoted to the husbands who give themselves up for them as the church should be to its Head. Whereas love can be expressed in many ways to many different people, there can only really be one person to whom you give yourself up in this complete way - only one person to whom you can really say, "All I am and all I have is yours." Having done that for one person, you are no longer yours to give away.

Sex is the physical expression of this complete abandoning of yourself to another person. "All I am and all I have is yours ... and that includes my body, which is yours for your delight." The husband and wife give themselves to one another in a physical way, and again, this complete giving of themselves is something that is only really meaningful in the context of a relationship with one person. It follows as a physical act from a commitment that has already been made.

Of course, this is thoroughly consistent with the content of the wedding service with which we are still so culturally familiar. But it is a major departure from the ideas of sex which we get from the culture around us. The ideas which have become common currency in the last 30 years and which simply didn't exist before - like sexual compatibility and trial marriages - simply have no place in the Christian worldview. It's not a question of a reactionary attempt to turn the clock back. It's the fact that the Christian worldview is so fundamentally different from the materialistic one that hardly any of what has been derived from materialism can be meaningfully accommodated if you start from the Christian worldview.

Christians don't talk about this too much, and in many cases they haven't thought out what their worldview says about it. There are many sections of Christianity which simply work out some way of accommodating the materialistic approach - after all, this is usually easier than being "in the world but not of the world". Sections of the church work out how to accommodate homosexuality at all levels, nobody asks questions about people's lifestyles, Bible teachers avoid speaking about, or relativise, the sections of the Bible that address matters of sexual morality. Perhaps most disturbingly, Christian parents lack confidence in offering guidance to their children. The consequence of this is that even people who consider themselves Christians rarely demonstrate anything distinctive in terms of their sexual morality.

As Christians, we need to have a clear idea of the impact that the Christian worldview has, in this area as much as all others. We also need to understand the change in worldview which has been expressed in cultural changes, and be prepared to point out to the people around us the consequences of their worldview. If Christianity is true (which we believe it is), it should be true no matter how deeply you scratch it. If the alternative worldviews are false (which we believe they are), then at some level there must be a contradiction between expected and observed phenomena. This can be seen in the breakdown of society which has taken place following the adoption of the materialistic worldview, and the fact that materialism simply fails to give a good account for so many of the things that we see.

I hope that this article helps Christians to be more confident in giving a reason for the hope that is in them ....

Thoughts on Iraq - rather late, I guess

I suppose I ought to be pleased that a church in Baghdad has re-opened. But the goodness of that news is overwhelmed by the badness of the news in general about Iraq over the last few years. I am under no illusions about the wickedness of Saddam Hussein. However, the wickedness of a leader doesn't provide justification under law for intervention in the internal affairs of a nation, and the moral case for intervention is undermined by the indifference of the same leaders who intervened to wicked governments elsewhere in the world, and their own use of morally unacceptable means in pursuit of their aims.

In addition to which, the situation in Iraq is now far less sympathetic to Christianity than it was under an authoritarian regime - and if in the fullness of time the democracy decides to establish an Islamic regime, or if the country decides that balkanisation is the way forwards, or if the new regime is unable to prevent a slide into anarchy - all of which options seem as likely as the "dream scenario" of a stable, tolerant, liberal democratic government - then the environment for Christianity will have been substantially weakened.

The intervention of the US/UK and other members of the international community in Iraq was not a "Christian" action - the Christian message is not directed towards international politics, and does not give guidance in this area to leaders of nations who happen to be Christians, other than the general principles (things like acting justly, loving mercy, walking humbly before God).

John Piper on Baptism

I've e-chatted with various people on the internet - on Miss Mellifluous' and Jon's blogs, for example - about the issue of baptism. It was really helpful to find the case made in "Brothers, we are not Professionals" for the baptist view that baptism ought to be upon profession of faith, and is not for infants as the successor of circumcision.

... The justification of infant baptism in the Reformed churches hangs on the fact that baptism is the New Testament counterpart of circumcision.

There is in fact an important continuity between the signs of circumcision and baptism, but the Presbyterian representatives of Reformed theology seem to have undervalued the discontinuity. This is the root difference between Baptists and Presbyterians on baptism. I am a Baptist because I believe that on this score we honor botht the continuity and discontinuity between Israel and the church and between their respective covenant signs.

The continuity is expressed like this: Just as circumcision was administered to all the physical sons of Abraham who made up the physical Israel, so baptism should be administered to all the spiritual sons of Abraham who make up the spiritual Israel, the church. Consider the difference between the "old covenant" people of God and the "new covenant" people of God as Jeremiah and the author of Hebrews describe them. Both these Biblical writers say that under the new covenant one will not have to look at other members of the covenant and say, "Know the Lord," for to be a covenant member is to know the Lord. This implies that entry into the old covenant people of God was by physical birth, and entry into the new covenant people of God is by spiritual birth. It would seem to follow, then, that the sign of the covenant would reflect this change and would be administered to those who give evidence of spiritual birth...

Calvin and some of his heirs have treated signs of the covenant as if no significant changes happened with the coming of Christ. But God is forming His people today differently from when he strove with an ethnic people called Israel. The visible people of God are no longer formed through natural birth but through new birth and in expression through faith in Christ.

With the coming of John the Baptist and Jesus and the apostles, the emphasis now is that the spiritual status of our parents does not determine our membership in the covenant community. The beneficiaries of the blessings of Abraham are those who have the faith of Abraham. These are the ones who belong to the covenant community.

(Brothers, we are not Professionals, John Piper, pp.133-135)

It was even more helpful to read his last paragraph in this chapter, which really reflects where I had ended up of my own accord, anyway!

Why have I dwelt on this? Because my sense is that many pastors, in order not to be contentious on this issue, neglect it almost entirely and do not call people to "repent and be baptized." What I am doing here is trying to model a responsible and reasonable defense of one view of baptism in the context of amicable and respectful relationships with those who hold other views. I think we need to teach our people the meaning of baptism and obey the Lord's command to baptize converts (Matt. 28:19), without elevating the doctrine to a primary one that would unduly cut us off from shared worship and ministry with others who share more important things with us.

(Ibid)

The whole article can be found on the Desiring God website.

Calvinism/Arminianism

If I had to choose one or the other, I would say I was a Calvinist. I certainly wouldn't go beyond Calvinism - after all, since we have no knowledge now of what God's sovereign purposes are in particular cases, they can't really determine our actions. But I do believe that God has somehow chosen certain people to be saved.

Yes, I know that causes problems. However, the theological cost of Arminianism is too great. David Heddle has a post on the issue here.

A biblical theology of giving

Stewardship Services is an organisation that has been established to assist Christian believers and the church as a whole in the matter of giving and financial administration. On their website, they say:

We see Stewardship as more than a service. It is a value - a lifestyle choice that recognises God's ownership of all that we have.

Our approach is twofold:

• Facilitating effective giving - serving over 20,000 donors, we distribute more than £30 million of giving into God's world every year.
• Promoting biblical principles and practice - of joyful giving, planned stewardship, and generosity.

As a church treasurer, I found the attitude of Stewardship Services considerably more servant-like than CAF - who, after all, are less specifically a Christian organisation.

Derek Bigg, the author of "In Pursuit of the Truth", was invited by them to contribute an article for their website, "Christian Stewardship: A Biblical Perspective". The article explores some of the ideas covered in the last chapter of his book relating to our use of money.

As we now consider what the way of grace means for us today, we must first of all accept that the New Testament contains no direct teaching on regular, long-term giving. We only have the apostle Paul’s instructions in his letters to Corinth regarding a special collection. As with so many practical issues, we must look for the basic principles underlying the specific teaching given in the 1st century. We then have to apply them to our own 21st century situation. In 2 Corinthians 8-9 we find five principles of major significance. Here they are:
• Adopt the right attitude.
• Let your heart be the arbiter.
• Give in proportion to blessing received.
• Aim for Christian equality.
• Follow the example of Christ.

Jonathon Edwards

I'm naturally upset that Jonathon Edwards, former Olympic Triple Jump gold medal winner and well-known Christian, should be expressing doubt about his faith. However, I'm not convinced the rejection of Christianity is as unequivocal as the interviewer for the Times Online suggests.

Also, I have to say that if the following really represents the heart of his intellectual crisis, then you have to wonder what exactly was the foundation of his faith.

Edwards says. “During my documentary on St Paul, some experts raised the possibility that his spectacular conversion on the road to Damascus might have been caused by an epileptic fit. It made me realise that I had taken things for granted that were taught to me as a child without subjecting them to any kind of analysis. When you think about it rationally, it does seem incredibly improbable that there is a God.”

Firstly, think about what happened at the time of Paul's conversion. From seeking to wipe out the proto-church, Paul went through his own crisis of faith, which lasted several years (though within days, he was arguing that Jesus was the promised Messiah), following which he travelled round the Roman empire, planting churches and intellectually challenging the prevailing worldviews. In this context, describing what happened to Paul as "an epileptic fit" is a bit like describing the start of the universe as "a big bang" - litotes, if ever I came across it.

But then, suppose we were to observe what happened to Paul today and conclude that it was an epileptic fit. If there is a God like that described in the Bible, doesn't he have authority over such things? Doesn't he oversee the circumstances in which these things happen?

I can't see why the possibility that the vehicle used by God was an epileptic fit is any grounds for a person to lose confidence in what the Bible says. I'm sorry that Edwards should have done so, and I hope to be more faithful in praying for him now than I was when he was the Christian that the media loved.

Counter-culture in universities

I am thankful to the Witts for pointing out this article in World Magazine, by Marvin Olasky.

The back story is that Guillermo Gonzalez, co-author of "Privileged Planet", has been denied tenure at Iowa State University. This was not because it is a common occurrence there, nor because of the quality of his academic record, but because unlike Ward and Brownlee, who wrote "Rare Earth", Gonzalez and Richards interpret their data within a non-naturalistic framework as revealing something about the nature and intent of a designer. It is worth pointing out, in this context, that there has been no substantive refutation of "Privileged Planet" - most of the response to the book from the naturalistic community has incorrectly identified it as nothing more than anthropicism ("Of course the universe is adapted to life, or we wouldn't be here."), or presented absurd caricatures of their arguments ("If the fact that life is uncommon suggests that there is a God, then if it never occurred, that would be absolute proof!" Douglas Adams did similar things with his arguments - except they were meant to be parodies).

I digress.

The effect of this seems to be pretty much to expect Gonzalez to leave ISU, and without the endorsement of the university. Opponents of ID ask why more scientists in mainstream universities don't talk about their beliefs in ID, and why more papers in support of ID aren't found in mainstream scientific journals. And yet good scientists are being effectively removed from mainstream institutions through political means - unsurprisingly, they find themselves work in institutions that are more open-minded to alternatives to naturalism. How exactly is ID supposed to become part of the mainstream scientific agenda when debate is closed down by political means, rather than by substantive and thoughtful interchange?

I digress.

Aaaaanyway, the reason for picking up the "WORLD Magazine" article was actually to disagree with it - or at least, the conclusion.

The possibility of building beachheads remains, but our larger goal should be to build up strong Christian colleges that can attract the best students.

How does this relate to the sub-culture/anti-culture/para-culture/counter-culture thing that I picked up from Tim Keller below - and which, incidentally, is a pattern we see not only in Acts but in Romans and Corinthians that I can think of off-hand? Olasky is pushing for something between an anti-culture and a para-culture. Christians are called to be counter-cultural.

The questions is: what would that look like?

PS Blogger now has Autosave - and I am sincerely thankful!

What's your theological worldview?

You know it's a quiet news week when you get two quizzes or memes in a row, but here goes ....

You scored as Evangelical Holiness/Wesleyan. You are an evangelical in the Wesleyan tradition. You believe that God's grace enables you to choose to believe in him, even though you yourself are totally depraved. The gift of the Holy Spirit gives you assurance of your salvation, and he also enables you to live the life of obedience to which God has called us. You are influenced heavily by John Wesley and the Methodists. Evangelical Holiness/Wesleyan 64% Neo orthodox 61% Reformed Evangelical 57% Fundamentalist 46% Emergent/Postmodern 46% Charismatic/Pentecostal 32% Roman Catholic 25% Classical Liberal 21% Modern Liberal 11% What's your theological worldview? created with QuizFarm.com

John Wesley? Are you kidding? My EFC roots showing ....

Tim Keller on Christians and culture

Rather note-like format - I suspect this is part of a delivered talk, rather than a written article.

We must not form:

a sub-culture in which we externally dress and talk (dialect) differently avoid certain gross behaviors, but internally we have the same values as the surrounding culture. (E.g. believers may not smoke or drink too much or have sex outside of marriage, yet in their core beings they may be as materialistic and individualistic, and status- or image-conscious as the society around.)

an anti-culture in which Christians feel highly polluted by the very presence of the unbelieving schools, entertainment, arts, and culture. In this model they feel they cannot really function in the society without getting the cultural power back through legislation and storming institutions directly.

a para-culture expecting a miraculous, sweeping intervention by God which will convert many or most individuals and explosively transform the culture. Instead of becoming deeply engaged with the society and people around them, working with others as co-citizens to deal with the troubles and problems, believers concentrate completely on evangelism and discipleship building up the church and their own numbers.

Rather we should form a counter-culture. This is the reverse of a 'sub-culture' - we are to be externally quite like the surrounding culture (positive toward and conversant with it), without 'jargon' and other Christian trappings - yet in worldview, values, and lifestyle, they demonstrate chastity, simplicity, humility and self-sacrifice. They are quite different in the way they understand money, relationships, human life, sex, and so on. Hananiah is an example of the 'para-culture' in Jeremiah 28; Jeremiah is a proponent of the 'counter-culture' in Jeremiah 29.

Christians and illiberal behaviour

Christians are generally considered to be more repressive, patriarchal and traditional than secular society - generally down on women, right?

Well, women at the church last night had a "bring-and-share pudding evening" - around 25 women, most from the church, some friends, took desserts to try a variety. Lots of friends were asked, and inevitably quite a few couldn't come, for a range of reasons.

But what was striking was that there were a significant number of non-Christian women who said they'd have to check with their husbands whether they would be allowed to come. Now I can't think of any of the women in the church who would need "permission" to be there - they might not be able to get there for practical reasons - but in no cases simply because their husband "said no". We were pretty amazed that this response could even be an option.

Tim Chester had a very helpful post on submission in marriage, an issue which is so against the spirit of the age it makes me squirm just reading the passages, and I believe the Bible is God's Word! He gives, as a useful summary:

The wife puts her husband’s will before her own.

The husband puts his wife’s interests before his own.

This captures, I think, the similarities in their respective attitudes (since mutual love and mutual submission are commended within the wider body of Christ of which they are members - see 5:2, 21). But it also captures the difference in their roles. It gives the husband a lead role, but a lead role defined by the cross - one which seeks the good of the other rather than self-interest. It also captures how their respective roles correspond to the roles of the church towards Christ and Christ towards the church.

So who invented paediatrics, then?

Well, nobody, one would have thought. The idea of medical care for children is no more unusual than that of care for adults, is it?

Actually, until as recently as several decades into the 20th Century, this was not the case. Children got sick and died; they were considered "replaceable". Radio 4's Last Word this week talks about Dr Beryl Corner. She fought against a patriarchal system and the belief of obstetricians that there was no need for paediatricians, to establish one of the first special care baby units in the UK in 1942. It gained an international reputation.

These days, we parents take for granted that appropriate facilities will be available for poorly infants. But it was partly her influence that led to this.

Oh, by the way, it doesn't mention it in the synopsis, but it does in the programme. Her motivation for doing this was her Christian belief. She believed that Christ had died for all children, no matter what their illness or disability.

"Seize the day..."

... the ethos of the Dead Poets' Society - "to suck out all the marrow of life." Is this a Christian attitude?

Romans 8:6 says (ESV):

To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.

Note that "flesh" here doesn't mean sex, but about things that are bound up with this world.

John Keating was right, in a sense - far too many people just drift through life, and we don't want to waste time - we have to be good stewards of our time as with everything else. But it's not for the reasons that he gives - that is, it's not because in 100 years' time we will be food for worms. From a Christian point of view, that's not how we see things. If our minds are set upon life and peace, then we are conscious of the fact that the day is coming when we will live for ever, and we will perhaps have the opportunity to do things that we can't even conceive of now!

So Keating's formulation of "seize the day" isn't the Christian perspective. Our minds aren't set on "death" - we don't seize the day because we will be dead tomorrow - because from a Christian point of view "to die is gain". Instead, our lives are set upon life and peace - our motivation is the fact that God has given us these things through his grace, and we are to use well what he has given us.

More from Francis Schaeffer

It would be hard to overestimate the impact that Francis Schaeffer's work has had on my life - either directly, or filtered through the many other people who he influenced during the 20th Century. I included a link in the post below to a website which gathers together various items relating to him. Here's a quote from it which pretty much represents my thoughts on philosophy/religion.

Basically, the biblical perspective is this. First, there is an infinite-personal God who exists and who has created the external universe, not as an extension of His own essence, but out of nothing. Something of the nature of this created universe can be found out by reason because that is the way the infinite-personal God has created it. The universe is neither chaotic nor random, but orderly. Cause and effect is real, but this cause and effect is not in a closed system, but rather in an open system -- or, to say it in a different way, it is a cause-and-effect system in a limited time span. Though this universe has an objective existence apart from God, it does not operate solely on its own; it is not autonomous. God is not a slave to the cause-and-effect world He has created, but is able to act into the cause-and-effect flow of history.

Second, God has made man in His own image, and this means, among other things, that man too can act into the cause-and-effect flow of history. That is, man cannot be reduced to only a part of the machine; he is not an automaton.

Third, not only can God act into the world, but He is not silent; He has spoken to men in the historic, space-time situation. The Bible and Christ in His office of prophet have given a propositional, verbalized communication to men that is true about God, true about history, and true about the cosmos. This should not take us by surprise, for if God has made man in His own image and has made us so that we can verbalize facts propositionally to each other on a horizontal level of communication, then it is natural that the infinite God who is personal would also communicate vertically to man in the same way. Of course, we must be careful to make a distinction here. Although God has not given us exhaustive knowledge (only He is infinite), He has given us true knowledge (what I have often called true truth)-- true knowledge about Himself, about history, and about the cosmos.

Fourth, the universe as it is now is not normal; that is, it is not now as it was when it was first created. Likewise, man is no longer as he was when first created. Therefore, from God's side there is the possibility of a qualitative solution for man as he is now and for man's cruelty, without man ceasing to be man.

(Francis A. Schaeffer, The Church Before the Watching World, Ch. 1)

Here's another quick quote ....

When all is done, when all the alternatives have been explored, "not many men are in the room" -- that is, although world-views have many variations, there are not many basic world-views or basic presuppositions.

Christian Thinktank

I've not come across this before, and I don't know how reliable or orthodox it is - it certainly doesn't look particularly lovely - but there's lots on it, about all sorts of "difficult questions" - racism, women, OT ethnic cleansing, oral traditions of the gospels ...

Blasphemy against the Holy Spirit

What is it?

We find out in Mark chapter 3:22-30.

And the teachers of the law who came down from Jerusalem said, "He is possessed by Beelzebub! By the prince of demons he is driving out demons."

So Jesus called them and spoke to them in parables: "How can Satan drive out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. If a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand. And if Satan opposes himself and is divided, he cannot stand; his end has come. In fact, no one can enter a strong man's house and carry off his possessions unless he first ties up the strong man. Then he can rob his house. I tell you the truth, all the sins and blasphemies of men will be forgiven them. But whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven; he is guilty of an eternal sin."

He said this because they were saying, "He has an evil spirit."(NIV)

So Jesus talks about people "blaspheming against the Holy Spirit" in the context of the teachers of the law saying that things done in the power of God were actually done in the power of Satan. They should have been able to recognise the power of God to work for good - but they deliberately chose to interpret it as satanic power. Blasphemy against the Holy Spirit isn't something you can do by mistake. It's not something you can casually do. It is about being close enough to God to see him working - but then interpreting his work as being evil rather than good.

The closest comparable situation I've come across in my own experience is somebody who is convinced that the assurance some other people have of their salvation (which the Bible says comes from God) was actually satanic - when the evidence in those people's lives was also clearly that God was at work in them.

I mention this having come across this website. Some thoughts.

Firstly, you can't decide anybody's eternal destiny, not even your own. Only God can do that. Whilst taking part in the activities described on the website hardly constitute a healthy spiritual discipline, I don't believe they have "binding value" as far as God is concerned.

Secondly, I doubt that there are many people sending in videos who have been in a position to see what God's work is like - certainly not in the same clear, unambiguous way that the teachers of the law had when they said that Jesus was working in the power of Beelzebub. I suspect that you can't blaspheme against the Holy Spirit unless you know what the Holy Spirit's work is like, and I doubt that most of these people do.

Finally, that notwithstanding, provoking people to damn themselves is very serious. Not for the people provoked, but for the provokers.

1Jesus said to his disciples: "Things that cause people to sin are bound to come, but woe to that person through whom they come. It would be better for him to be thrown into the sea with a millstone tied around his neck than for him to cause one of these little ones to sin. So watch yourselves. Luke 17:1-3 (NIV)

The people who put together the website are in greater need of prayer than the people who send in a video.

I'm slightly surprised that Pascal's Wager doesn't have more impact. I suppose that shows how much confidence people have that there is no God. Which is odd, given the large proportion of people who think that there is a God.

(I feel honour-bound to point out that David Heddle has a post with the same title, that makes similar points - though almost certainly more thoughtfully and accurately. However, since most of my hits at the moment are coming through the link to my post that he included in his, this is perhaps hardly necessary!)