Category: Christian Doctrine

Deeper Waters Podcast 12/20/2014: Paul Rainbow

What’s coming up this Saturday on the Deeper Waters Podcast? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

The writings of John in the New Testament are noted for being difficult to understand. His Gospel is markedly different from the other Gospels. Let’s not forget about the book of Revelation either! Chesterton in his book Orthodoxy said “Though St. John the Evangelist saw many strange monsters in his vision, he saw no creature so wild as one of his own commentators.”

A book I went through not too long ago on this topic is Johannine Theology by Dr. Paul Rainbow. After reading it, I was convinced that this was an important topic that needed some more discussion and so I asked Dr. Rainbow to come on the show. So who is he?

Dr. Rainbow was born in Minneapolis in 1955 and studied at Born 1955, Minneapolis.
Studied at U. Minnesota, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Harvard Divinity School, and U. Oxford (England). He taught briefly at Canadian Bible College when it was in Regina SK (1980–82) before undertaking advanced studies. He served on staff as a Lay Assistant at St Ebbe’s Church, Oxford (Church of England = Anglican), 1987–88. He has been at Sioux Falls Seminary (German Baptist) for the last 26 years teaching New Testament. He is married to Alison and they have two grown children. For a hobby, he is also a classical pianist.
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As you can imagine, Johannine theology is about the doctrine of God that is found in the Gospel, the epistles of John, and the Apocalypse. For the sake of argument, we will be assuming that these are all Johannine writings. It is worth noting that Rainbow does give a defense of authorship, but it will be more important in the interview for us to focus on the main subject matter.
Many of us read the Gospel of John and think that it’s meant to reveal the nature of Jesus. Of course, to a degree, it is, but it goes beyond that. It’s mainly to show us the nature of God. The way that we know who God is is by looking at Jesus. Is Jesus the full and best revelation? Yes, but He is the full and best revelation of the Father and if we are to know the Father, then we will have to know the Son as well.
This is definitely a complex topic, but if you’re a follower of the Deeper Waters Podcast, you should be used to complex topics. Still, we will try to keep it as simple as we can so that the average listener can get the most out of it.
I hope that you’ll be watching your podcast feed soon in order to catch this episode and I encourage you to go to Amazon as well and pick up a copy of Rainbow’s book if you’re interested in studying the doctrine of God in the writings of John. John’s writings are difficult so we will be working to take full advantage of having a scholar in the field help us sort through the difficult issues.
In Christ,
Nick Peters

Book Plunge: Christ Crucified by Donald Macleod

What do I think about Donald Macleod’s book on the atonement? Let’s talk about it on Deeper Waters.

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Paul wrote to the Corinthians that he desired to know nothing else save Christ and Him crucified. Why? What makes the crucifixion of Christ so central? What is it about those six hours on a Friday afternoon that forever rocked the world?

Donald MacLeod’s work is all about this event and what all it entails as he goes through the Gospels and the rest of the New Testament writings. This is an in-depth look at the doctrine of the atonement. After going through it, you should never think about the doctrine the same way and a reading of this got me to realize I need to think about the atonement more seriously.

So let’s cover the positives. First off, the first couple of chapters are just gripping as we go through a brief look at the life of Christ but described in terms of what the events must have been like for the Christ and how He was rejected by the world and His friends and the weight of bearing the sin of the world on the cross.

In fact, I’d say this was my favorite part of the book and if you purchase it (As IVP sent me a review copy and I greatly thank them for that) then this part will easily be worth the whole price of the book. I do not consider myself an emotional person and empathy is not a strong suit of mine, but I still found myself gripped by what I was reading.

Second positive, Macleod goes into great detail on theological terms used in Scripture like Propitiation and redemption and terms we might not think too much about. A section I thought would last a few pages turned out to go through a whole chapter.

Third, Macleod gives an apologetic presentation as well answering questions at the end such as if there was another way. He looks at rival theories that seek to explain the death of the Christ without it being a substitution and blood atonement. He also throughout the book answers charges of cosmic child abuse and other such claims.

Finally, Macleod ends the book rightly where he should, with a look at what this means for the Great Commission. He shows us that by the work of Christ, the devil has been defeated and we are free to go into the world and fulfill the Great Commission.

Now let’s talk about ways I thought the book could have been improved. On a minor point, Macleod is quite sure that Jesus was buried honorably. This is a point that I would contest. This is only a minor one, but it did stand out to me.

Second, Macleod raises some questions about divine impassibility, the idea that God does not have emotions. I found this troubling throughout as the ramifications of God being emotional are problematic as I think it ends up being a deity that is changing and progressing and in fact, dependent on His creation. A few times Macleod points to how it must have been for the Father to see His Son on the cross and at suffering in the heart of God. The theory of the atonement does not depend on God suffering and I found such ideas raising questions that I do not think are adequately answered if impassibility is denied.

Third, I would have liked to have seen more on justification. There was not a whole chapter on it and that would have been a welcome inclusion. Especially I would have liked to have seen how Macleod’s view of the atonement would interact with the New Perspective on Paul. Could we see some interaction with Wright and Dunn and others?

The good thing is that none of these negatives ultimately distract from the book as a whole. You can still walk away with a good theory of the atonement and understand that these are points you can disagree on. The argument as a whole still stands as none of these points are central.

In conclusion, I do recommend the work as one if you want to understand the atonement more thoroughly as Macleod has gone highly in-depth and we owe him a debt of gratitude.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Faith Is Not A Virtue

Does it really help you out if you are said to believe something? Let’s talk about it on Deeper Waters.

So many times in church services I often hear that the point of Jesus doing such and such or God telling us such and such is that we will have faith. In one sense, this is true and noble, but in the sense that I suspect most people use this term, I do not think that it is noble at all. Most people think of faith as just believing in something. As I have argued, faith is really more akin to an active trust in someone.

Imagine a person who said they believed entirely that travel by airplane was safe, yet when it came a time that this person needed to make a long trip, he refused to act on that and instead chose to drive or take some other means of transportation. Picture someone who said he believed that his doctor was right on what was necessary for his health, but at the same time refused to ever act on the advice of the doctor. Would we count any of those as good positions to have?

In the same way, let’s suppose that you believe God exists. Let’s suppose you believe the Bible is the Word of God. Let’s suppose you believe Jesus has all the attributes of God. Let’s suppose that you believe Jesus rose from the dead. Does that count anything to your credit?

Nope.

It doesn’t? Look at what James tells you! James tells us that the demons believe that there is one God, and they tremble! The sad reality is that many who claim to be Christians do less about the reality of God than the demons do. Isn’t it a shame that according to Scripture, demons take the reality of God more seriously than Christians do?

Of course, all Christians should believe those truths, but that does not mean that believing those truths alone will make a difference. What good will it do you to believe in a truth that you will not act on? If anything, your situation is made worse by your believing those claims. After all, what benefit does it do you to believe in a truth and then act as if that is not really true or that it does not matter. You believe that Jesus is the resurrected Lord? Okay. What good does that do if you don’t live like He’s the resurrected Lord?

When faith is seen as trust, then we are getting to what it is that we need. When Christians start not just saying that they believe something but start living like they believe something, then the differences that need to take place will occur. You believe Jesus is Lord? Then live like you’re supposed to spread the Kingdom? You believe God is the one who you should seek to know the most? Then actually consider learning more about him than your favorite TV show or sports team. You think the Bible is the greatest book of all? Then do yourself a favor and actually study it and treat it like a a piece of literature instead of treating it simplistically.

If you can get someone to believe something, then that is good. Life does not stop with just belief though. We must get people to learn to act according to belief and learn all the ramifications of what it is that they believe and what difference it makes. When belief itself is treated as a virtue, people are tempted to stop right there. Belief is not a virtue. Living in active trust, true faith, is.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Why Do You Doubt?

What makes people doubt Christianity? Let’s talk about it on Deeper Waters.

A friend recently sent me an article by Peter Enns where Enns talks about the question of doubt and wants to know why Christians doubt. Doubt is a topic I’ve experienced a lot of familiarity with and take seriously. Most people know about my relationship with Gary Habermas and Mike Licona, both of whom have been very forward about their experiences in dealing with doubt. Both of them are also excellent scholars in their field.

This post is not going to deal with how to deal with doubt at this point. I’d just like to talk about what the problem is. This will also go to both sides of the spectrum. It can be why non-Christians doubt that Christianity is true, but it can also be about why believing Christians doubt that Christianity is true. This will be specified more in future posts.

Doubt is very common amongst Christians and in fact amongst anyone. If someone has a worldview and they never experience any doubt of their worldview or never have before, then that person is simply not taking their worldview seriously. Doubt is not a sign of a problem necessarily, but in fact can be a stepping stone to a greater understanding of one’s own worldview and if one has a wrong worldview, motivation to change it.

Generally, doubt falls into three categories. This does not just apply to Christianity. People can doubt any worldview for these three reasons.

The first is intellectual doubt. Intellectual doubt is usually seen as the most common, but in reality, it isn’t. Intellectual doubt can often be a smokescreen. A great way to find out of if intellectual doubt is the problem is to answer the question and see what kind of response you get. If you get a response that starts with “But what if?” then you are most likely dealing with emotional doubt.

Intellectual doubt is really the simplest of all to treat. The way to answer intellectual doubt is to just get more information. It means you go to the local library or bookstore and start getting out resources and doing the necessary study so you can learn. If one is never satisfied by such study, one needs to move on and see if there is another reason for doubt.

Emotional doubt is the next on the list. This is the one I’d say is the most common and is rooted not in reason, but in the emotions, although it often takes the guise of reason. Blaise Pascal spoke of taking the greatest champion of reason and suspending him on a platform of sufficient size over a huge chasm. Watch what happens as his imagination overtakes his reason.

This is the cause of phobias. For instance, if someone is afraid of flying, it will not matter if you quote to them all the statistics in the world on it being safer to fly than it is to drive. They will not be able to see it because of their emotions. This includes myself as well until I finally took my first flight and now I simply adore flying. One aspect I enjoy of going on a long trip sometimes is that I get to fly again.

Emotional doubt happens when what one feels overpowers what they think. For instance, one could say they don’t think atheism is true because life would be meaningless without God. I by and large agree with that, but that is not a reason that atheism is not true. It could be atheism is true and life is meaningless.

This is especially problematic since emotional responses are usually the reason we believe many claims. I think of the old hymn where it says “You ask me how I know He lives? He lives within my heart!” Such a reason will not convince a world any more than the Mormons talking about the burning in the bosom convinces you. If a Muslim tells you he knows in his heart that Muhammad is a prophet, you are not going to be convinced.

Emotional doubt also goes with false expectations. When we expect God to provide certain feelings and that the Christian life should be a certain way, we will naturally have doubt if this does not happen. We can be guilty of wanting something that God never promised. There will be more on this later.

The problem of evil definitely falls into this. Evil in itself can never prove Jesus did not rise from the dead, nor does it disprove theistic arguments. These stand or fall on their own. Evil does give an experiential basis for doubt. It hits so close to home that it is a problem that needs to be addressed. The problem of evil is often addressed intellectually, which is really as an academic subject the way it must be addressed, but when dealing with someone affected by it deeply and presently hurting from it, one absolutely must touch the emotional side. I have often told people who I have taught that if you’re ever a pastor at a church and a woman comes to you from your congregation whose son just died in a car accident and she’s crying asking why God allowed this to happen, that if you turn into a philosopher and/or apologist at that moment, I will come over and smack you. Yes. She will need that, but at that present moment, she just needs to grieve. She needs a pastor and a counselor first. When the shock has worn off, then you can handle the intellectual difficulty. (Note that it is far better to deal with that intellectual difficulty prior. All Christians need to get an answer for evil in their mind beforehand.)

The final kind of doubt is volitional doubt. I have no doubt some Christians doubt atheism and some atheists doubt Christianity for these reasons, and they are the worst. It is not about a search for truth at all or seeking to not have emotions control reason. It is about not wanting to believe.

For instance, someone could not want to be a Christian because they have a sin in their life, such as rampant extra-marital or pre-marital sex, and they know becoming a Christian means giving that up and they don’t want to. Sin is a reason a number of people can refuse to become Christians. Some of you reading might say “That’s not me!” I contend only you and God know the answer to that one. If you are doubting Christianity, at least make sure this is not the reason why.

After all, suppose you think God is the most wicked being who ever has been. If Christianity is true, that won’t change the fact that He exists and that Christianity is true. It could mean you have a wrong view of Him and that false view of Him is blinding you from seeing Him as He is. There are some who have said they would prefer to go to Hell instead of being in the manifest loving presence of God. The sad reality is God is ready to grant them their wish. Instead, I recommend trying to see why God acts so different from what you expect. There is no doubt some emotional thinking in volitional doubt, but this kind of doubt deals more with the will. An emotional doubter can want to believe. A volitional doubter doesn’t want to, and it will require changing the will, a much harder process. Anyone who has overcome an addiction or tried to lose those few extra pounds on a diet should know this. You have to work to change what it is that you really want.

These ultimately are the broad categories of why doubt takes place. Over time, I hope to be able to look at these and give recommendations on dealing with them.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

The Parking Space God

Is God your personal genie? Let’s talk about it on Deeper Waters.

I was very pleased yesterday to hear my pastor speak out against those people that talk about how God provided a parking space for them when they were driving around and in a hurry. (Personally, I think if people would just be willing to park a distance away, not only would they get in some exercise, but they’d be in and out sooner instead of having to have the “terrible drudgery” of walking a little bit longer, especially when they’re going into a store where they’ll be walking a long time.)

This is along the lines of looking at what has been called Moral Therapeutic Theism. God is there in our lives to make things easier for us. When trouble comes, we look up and ask “What’s gone wrong?” It’s a wonder that we do this since we are in fact promised that we will have suffering.

My wife happens to be enjoying the Vikings series on the History Channel now and last night we saw an episode where a Viking agreed to be baptized, though apparently for show, and the way his fellow Vikings responded to him. Most notably was that how he had betrayed the gods. (And our preview of next week’s episode shows that he is to be offered as a sacrifice and it’s directly tied in to his getting baptized.)

Yet this is what Christians from the beginning had and what Christians around the world still face. It’s not something like changing your career. It’s making a statement about how you view the world and where your loyalty lies. To become a Christian would mean that to those who were loyal to the old view and the old deities, you are a threat. (That also includes the loyalty to the idea of a lack of deities)

Today, we have this idea reversed. We think that God is to serve us. God is to make our lives easier and if he does not do this, then something is wrong. We have lost the idea that we are to be servants. When we think God is to serve us, we make it clear that we view ourselves as greater than God, for who is greater, the master or the servant?

This also ends up with God being trivial. Of course God could provide a good parking space if He wanted, but why think He’s micromanaging the universe just so you don’t have to walk a little bit further? (In fact, in many cases, that could be encouraging laziness)

It also leads to embarrassment before others. I had a friend on Facebook recently put up a status about a lady in line behind him at the grocery store who said God told her to come to another store across town to save 50 cents on one item. My friend was thinking she probably spent that much on gas. What’s the impression given by this? Christians are idiots and God talks to them about matters like this.

Yet what about the person who is going through a struggle and says they want God to show up and nothing happens? What about the person who is not looking for a parking space but is looking for a meal to feed their family? What about the person who is wondering if God will heal their cancer?

Of course, God can provide small blessings at times to people for various reasons, but to emphasize those as a sure sign of His favor brings great pain to those in more dire situations and makes God appear trivial. It becomes the case that God is one who wants you to just sit back and be comfortable and let Him take care of everything.

Now in the long run, God does take care of things. If something is not in our control, by all means do your part and then leave the rest to God, but note that you are to do your part. If you want to be a good apologist, you are to read. If you want to be in good health, diet and exercise. If you want to be in a certain career path, then you need to study for that path and go to school. If you want to be an athlete, you need to train.

The church today needs a robust theology that recognizes God as the sovereign Lord of the universe and not a personal genie. We are to serve Him. He is not to serve us.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Is God a SadoMasochist?

Is the cross just a sick and depraved act? Let’s talk about it on Deeper Waters.

Recently, this video was brought to my attention. Be warned that it does contain strong profanity for all interested as well as some disturbing images. I put it up here just so that readers can make sure I have given an accurate representation of the video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YXXgUpv7APE

Now lately, I’ve spent much time blogging about how we have the gospel wrong. We have taken a part of it, forgiveness, which is an important part, and made it the whole deal.

When John the Baptist and Jesus showed up teaching the gospel, most people were not thinking about forgiveness. The Jewish system already had a way set up where you could receive forgiveness and there was no major need to replace it. Of course, some did come for forgiveness as Jesus was showing how forgiveness would work in the Kingdom, but Jesus did not preach an unheard of concept. All the Jews knew about forgiveness.

Jesus taught something greater. He taught that the plan of Israel was coming to a fruition. God was about to act to rectify the problem. What problem is that? It is the problem of sin and evil and death. Our teaching today tends to ask about the cross “What does it do for me?” It is foreign for us to think about the rest of the world.

So in replying to the producer of the vid, who based on his name I will just call BD for short, we will need to keep this in mind. Nowhere is there any material about the kingdom of God in the video, or about the problem of evil, or anything about the story of Israel.

Note also something else important that never shows up in the video. Never do we see an argument against the existence of God. We do not see an argument that shows that the resurrection did not happen. It is as if BD just wants to hit us with an emotional attack and make us not think about the real claim. If God exists and if Jesus did rise, then Christianity is true and that must be dealt with.

So let’s deal with some errant concepts that show up.

BD has a terrible rendition of the Trinity where the Son is the reincarnation (How can there be a reincarnation without a first incarnation) of the Father. However, he also uses the classic Bill Maher type of argumentation where God sends Himself to sacrifice to Himself, Himself to solve the problem that He Himself created.

If BD does not want to be a Christian. Fine. If he wants to think the Trinity is nonsense. Fine. Yet in all of this, at least get the concept right. If someone wants to be an atheist, at least seek to be an informed atheist. When I see a misrepresentation of the Trinity in this way I automatically know this is someone who doesn’t know what he’s talking about. A good library would have volumes that would help give BD some understanding of the Trinity even if he doesn’t believe in it.

BD also wishes to point out that some people have suffered worse than Jesus. This is not being denied. But so what? BD assumes the worst part of the crucifixion was the pain of the cross. Of course the cross was physically painful, but it was more designed to be socially painful. It was designed to shame the criminal before others and thus give the notion to anyone else watching that “Maybe you don’t want to do what this guy did.”

Furthermore, Jesus being shamed was said thus to be a traitor to Rome and to be under the curse of YHWH. This is what makes the resurrection so important. The resurrection is the vindication of the claim of Jesus to be the King of Israel. It is God raising Him up so He can rule, since a dead king cannot rule the Kingdom of God. It is a reversal of the shame and God giving Jesus the place of highest honor.

So what about that sacrifice? How could it be a sacrifice if Jesus knew He was coming back? When something was offered to God, God could do with it what He wanted. Jesus had to face shame and death as it was entirely to take on the full curse for us. (If you remember, Genesis 3 has a little something about a curse) In facing death and shame head on, Jesus is able to overcome them for us. He is able to rectify the problems of evil, death, and sin.

This is why the story of Israel is so important. Genesis 3 is not an accidental test. It sets the whole tone of the Bible from then on. It’s not the case that the story of Abraham has nothing to do with that. The story has everything to do with it. Abraham’s role is to help restore that which was lost. Over and over, man fails at the attempt to rule as God desires, until finally Jesus comes who is able to do that.

Well couldn’t God just forgive? Not exactly. God is the greatest good and thus has the greatest honor. If God decides He won’t punish sin, then He is not treating Himself as the greatest good. He is being inconsistent. If He does this just for us, then it is akin to idolatry.

God must be just. That must mean there must be some punishment given for sin. BD wishes to make it be that God delights in punishing us. If that was the case, then one wonders why forgiveness would be offered at all. If God just wanted to punish us, He could have been eternally just and never sent Jesus and no one could say “You’ve done wrong.” God is under no obligation to forgive anyone or even provide a way of forgiveness.

Of course, BD has the idea of Hell as a torture chamber. Is he truly unaware that there are many different views of Hell, including ones that see it as eternal conscious torment, that are not torture chamber motifs? This includes my own view that sees Heaven and Hell as not physical locations, but as relational realities. The same sun that melts wax hardens clay. The love of God that melts the hearts of the repentant hardens the hearts of those opposed.

In conclusion, we note that BD has not given any arguments against the central truths of Christianity but has chosen to speak (Quite ignorantly) of the parts he does not understand. Once again, if someone wants to be an atheist, be one, but at least be informed in your atheism.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Are Christians Supposed To Be Good?

Do we have the concept of a good person wrong? Let’s talk about it on Deeper Waters.

There’s a story about a professional basketball player who would often distance himself from his female fans, particularly since some female fans will have a tendency to really throw themselves at an athlete they admire. When asked why he would do this since so many other women were offended he replied, “If any woman is going to be offended, it’s not going to be my wife!” His first duty was to honor her and to do that, he would not even risk an event like that.

Yesterday, I started writing about Moral Therapeutic Theism. (MTT) One of the views of God in this is that Jesus came to make us be good people. We are often told that we are to love our neighbor as ourselves. Indeed, this is true. Yet this is a horizontal command. That is, it is a command about how man is to relate to man. It is often forgotten that this is the SECOND greatest command. The greatest is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.

#2 will make no sense without #1. If you do not love God, your love of man will be useless. If you put man before God, you are guilty of idolatry. The love of God must be foremost in your mind. Remember we love because He first loved us. The only way we can love our fellow man is because we have received the love of God. Even if we don’t acknowledge it, there are traces of God’s love all around us.

Yet our reasoning has by and large been horizontal. We do not speak out on sin in the world because we want to be good people. We don’t want to judge anyone. We don’t want to be critical. That’s not what Jesus would do to anyone after all is it?

Go read the NT, come back, and tell otherwise.

Of course, Jesus had love and grace and still does. Who was it towards? It was towards the people who knew about their sin and acknowledged it. Jesus never once made light of sin. He knew it was a serious consequence. Even in the case of the adulterous woman, He never denied the sin. He told her to go and sin no more. He dealt more seriously with the sin of hypocrisy he saw around Him and people who were wanting to use this woman for their own evil intentions.

Go read a chapter like Matthew 23. Go read most any conversation Jesus had with the Pharisees and Sadducees. Go read a passage like Luke 11. Jesus did not have any patience for people who were thinking they were righteous and not in any need of a savior.

If you do not have a problem with sin in your fellow man, then you are not loving God. Now you can be wrong in how you deal with it, but you have to realize that God does not coddle the sin of people He sees around Him. Christ sought to remove people from that bondage. He never sought to enable them in it.

If you make the love of man paramount and not offending your fellow man, meaning not dealing with evil when you see it, then you are not loving God. Keep in mind John in his gospel told us about people who did not come forward in support of Jesus because they wanted the honor of man more than the honor of God.

Now this doesn’t mean you’re to go out there as if you have no sin and go after everyone for every sin they commit. Yet you are not to turn a blind eye either. How you speak will be important and that will be learned only through the study of wisdom.

Our modern world has got us thinking the opposite. We are of the opinion that we are not to rock the boat at all. If the apostles had not rocked the boat, there would be no Christianity. Go read the epistles and see how seriously Paul took sin in the midst of the church. Go read Acts and see the forthrightness of the apostles. Go read Revelation and see how God judges sin. (Regardless of your views on eschatology, you can’t read Revelation and walk away thinking God takes sin lightly.)

A good person is not someone who just gets along with everyone. A good person is one who values what God values and opposes what God opposes. To be a truly good person today, one will have to know God. Note also that a good person is not the same necessarily as a nice person. A good person will do what he or she ought to do and not simply what will make people around them happy. In fact, if you’re a good person, you will quite often make people unhappy, much like Christ did.

Once again, there is no condemnation about being good. What is asked is that we be good the way God desires us to be. The world is not to set the bar for what is good. Goodness is found in God fundamentally and essentially and we must meet His criteria.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Is God There To Make You Feel Good?

Is God concerned about more than your feelings? Let’s talk about it on Deeper Waters.

A friend of Deeper Waters called me recently to talk about the post on applications in sermons. She had stated that she found that some researchers had asked about why people walk away and they found another answer. They referred to it as moral therapeutic theism. (MTT) The idea is that God is someone there who tells you how to be a good person and get along with everyone and to help you feel good about yourself, part of the whole self-esteem movement.

Now of course, there is nothing wrong with being a good person, properly understood. (Good person does not mean you never rock the boat. Jesus and the apostles certainly did.) There is also nothing wrong with feeling good about yourself, although if you are doing something wrong, you should not feel good about that. Yet is there a problem if you think that is the purpose of the Christian life?

To begin with, if you have this kind of approach, which I would agree is rampant in the church today, then it turns out that God is the servant of you and you are not the servant of God. An example of this is found in “The Shack” where at the end the main character at one time laughs at the thought of “God, my servant.”

So what happens when God lets you down on His end of the bargain supposedly? Then it becomes, who needs Him? It is not the biblical notion that every breath you take depends on Him. It is not the notion that you owe Him everything and He owes you nothing. It is not the notion that every single gift He gives you is grace and not a debt to be repaid.

When you realize God owes you nothing, you can better be appreciative for what He does give you.

Now to be sure, God does give us several things for us to enjoy, but we dare not mistake these for Him. The problem is that if God is just there to make us feel good, what happens when other things seem to make us feel so much better? What if God is really not supposed to give us warm fuzzies? What if that was never really promised in the Bible? What if God was never promised to be our personal therapist?

To begin with, if you find other sources of pleasure, then you will quickly forget about God. Why not? These are better. You can find more joy from sports, video games, television, food, drugs, sex, etc. Now aside from illegal drugs, I’m not condemning any of these totally. I don’t care for sports, but I know several who do. I happen to be an avid gamer. My wife and I have several television shows we like to watch together. My wife has enabled me to expand my diet and so I enjoy many more things in food today. Of course, as a married man, I enjoy sex. You think I’m going to say otherwise?

But let’s suppose that you don’t have that. You will see these as greater goods more likely than God instead of realizing that every good gift you have here comes from God. Do you give thanks for those good things? We often say our worldviews need a place to explain pain. They do! Yet our worldviews also need to be able to explain pleasure. Pleasure is not anti-Christian, but the sole goal of Christian life is not personal pleasure. (Excepting the John Piper version of Christian hedonism.)

What happens when a young man leaves home and later finds the joy of sex and then realizes that he’s not really feeling guilty and he’s having a darn good time. God will be pushed away from his mind. Of course, the exception might be for when he needs Him. God is there to pull him out of emergencies. The young man could find his desire for God suddenly restored when his girlfriend announce she’s pregnant.

Some of you might be thinking he might not enjoy a little fornication. I’ve got a sneaking suspicion though, and it is a suspicion seeing as I remained a virgin until I married, that one’s body doesn’t really know when one is doing something wrong sexually or not. The pleasure sensors act the exact same way. If doing something wrong made us feel miserable every time after all, we’d all live much better lives.

Does that mean these people will openly apostasize and become rabid internet atheists? No. Chances are they’ll just become apathetic. They won’t care. God will be nice when He shows up, but they have no concept that they are to be His slaves. They have no concept that He’s the sovereign Lord of the universe they owe everything to.

Tomorrow, I plan to write more on this topic as I have found it rather fascinating. For now, I just wish to state that we need to do all we can to avoid simply having MTT. We need a real view of the God who is there and to realize that He is on the throne, and not ourselves.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Does Christianity Make Claims?

Are we really thinking Christian? Let’s talk about it on Deeper Waters.

In light of the equal sign being in several places by Christians for the redefining of marriage, I just wonder what on Earth it is that we are teaching not just our youth, but even leaders in the church. Yes. There are some church leaders who are looking at this and not seeing the problem with it.

It is my contention that what has happened is that when we have gone to church services, we have made it all about us. Churches by and large just have application going on. Christianity is all about how you relate to your fellow man. Jesus came so we could know we ought to love one another and get along.

I kind of think the Son of God didn’t need to die just to give us that message.

Absent beyond that is any idea that the Christian faith makes claims about the world. We regularly speak in our church services about how Jesus is Lord and then don’t think about what that means. We go off and live our lives without considering “If Jesus is Lord, what does that say not just about how I live my life but the world around me?”

For instance, in May for our podcast, I’m hoping to have E. Calvin Beisner come on and talk about environmentalism. What does the Lordship of Christ have to do with the environment? He’ll give a much fuller look of course, but for now, we could say it means we are the stewards. It means we realize that ultimately, it all belongs to Him. It means that we can use it for our good, but we are not to abuse it. It means we are to respect it as His creation.

What does the Lordship of Christ say about politics? It says that man has been put in charge in various ways to govern the world, but that He should seek to have it be a good society driven by the holiness of God. This does not mean a theocratic state per se as no man can rule as God, but every man should have the idea of right and wrong informed by God and seek to instill the right. He should be willing to recognize the sinfulness of man and grant certain liberties knowing he is not the judge, jury, and executioner.

So, when a Christian goes to the voting booth, they should see what their Christianity says about all the issues and act accordingly. We cannot put a disjunction between Jesus and any other thing. As soon as we do that, we are saying there is something that Jesus is not the Lord of, and in that case He is not the Lord of all.

What does it say about marriage? Even without the homosexual debate, we Christians need to learn a lot in this. By the way, if you want to know why the world reached this state church, look in the mirror. It’s our fault. We were not honoring marriage as we should have been and allowed ideas like no-fault divorce to come in.

If you are a Christian who is married, you will look and see how Christianity affects your marriage. What does Christianity say about sex? What does it say about how you are to love one another? (Of course, the concept of loving one another should not be abandoned from Christianity, but it is not the total of Christianity.) What does it say about a husband leading his family? What does it say is the role of submission? What does it say about the raising of children?

If you are single, you too have the questions. Why should I consider marriage? Do I have to? Do I want to? (It can be perfectly valid to be a Christian and choose to remain single) If I marry, what kind of person will I marry? If I don’t marry, why is it that I am having to make a choice to abstain from having sex? How am I to live on my own and serve the Kingdom?

What does Christianity say about pleasure? Am I allowed to enjoy anything? If so, what? If a certain pleasure is forbidden for a Christian, why is it forbidden? Could it be a pleasure is not forbidden but is forbidden if done to excess? Is it possible to do it in the wrong way or in the wrong place?

Yet the most important questions we can ask about thinking Christian are to ask what are the claims about God, Christ, the Spirit, Scripture, and creation? These are questions not asked. Very few Christians have any kind of doctrine of God and then we sit back and wonder “Why is it that we lose Christians to the Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses?” Both of those groups have a doctrine of God. It is a false one, but it is a doctrine.

Who is God? What is He like? How do I know He exists? What about evil in the world? Who is Jesus? Did He exist? Did He do miracles? What were the claims He made? Did He rise from the dead? Who is the Spirit? Is He deity? Is He a person? What is the Bible? How did we get it? How was it written? When was it written? What is the purpose of creation? How does it exist? How did it begin to exist? (Those last two ARE different questions)

Of course, this list is not exhaustive by any means, but it is a start.

How do we get here?

First, our leadership needs to know better. If you are considering hiring a pastor, and his eyes glaze over when you ask “What is apologetics?” I recommend you move on. Your pastor needs to be able to defend the flock. I am not saying the pastor should be an apologist. That is not excluded however. Some apologists are not meant to be pastors. Every pastor does not have to focus on apologetics, but he should have a basic knowledge. If he cannot focus, he needs someone in his church who can.

Second, after the pastor, the rest of the staff needs to be questioned on essential Christian doctrine. Everyone who has some position of authority in a church needs to know a basic idea of what they believe and why. If not, it will only lead to the shame of the church when they make egregious mistakes and it will lead to the confusion of those in the church, especially the youth, who take these people as such authorities.

Third, every sermon should have more than just application. It should have a basis in order to know how to act out that application. Back in 2010, I had to speak at my grandmother’s funeral. Being one of three speakers and the last one, I had ten minutes to speak before I would then be an M.C. and help everyone talk about how they remembered my grandmother.

Only ten minutes. What did I do? I went straight to 1 Cor. 15, gave a brief apologetic for the creed in that passage and showed why it is we can argue Jesus rose from the dead, and then spent the rest of that time talking about what a difference it makes and why it would mean we’d see my grandmother again if we were in Christ, with a final call to urge people to be in Christ.

That talk was very well received!

In fact, I have generally found when I speak this way at churches with giving a basis and then an application, people really like what they hear. Believe it or not pastors, you can do the same thing! I did the one I talked about above remember in less than ten minutes. This will not be a huge distraction from your sermon, and if you think giving evidence for the truth of Christianity is a distraction, you have a problem.

Fourth, there need to be classes at the church on how to think Christian. We have classes on most everything else, and there is nothing wrong with that. I am not saying to cut out other classes. I am saying to add one. How can your church not benefit if people are learning to think Christian? Let it be a study of a book like “Cold-Case Christianity” or a class on how to answer a Mormon. Either way, get your church thinking.

Fifth, the laity need the freedom to challenge the pastor. If the pastor knows that after the sermon, some members of the laity will ask him hard questions if they don’t think they’ve been addressed, that will make a pastor study more. I have heard too many sermons that are done with no preparation and no exegesis of the text. They have a lot of passion, but they end there. Passion is not wrong, but passion is not going to help that mother in the congregation where her son dies in a car accident this week.

The crisis the church is in now is because we have not thought Christian. We have instead ran and hid and isolated ourselves in our little Christian bubbles and said we will have no contact with the rest of the world. We dare not do this any more. If we do not engage the world, we cannot be ready to take it for Christ, and according to the Great Commission, our marching orders are to take it for Christ. Ultimately, we isolate ourselves from Christ when we isolate ourselves from the world, for we are no longer serving Him, but rather just protecting ourselves.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

There’s A New King In Town

Is someone else claiming to be in charge? Let’s talk about it on Deeper Waters.

There’s a Christmas song describing the birth of Jesus that says that there’s a new kid in town. A look at Matthew’s gospel would of course indicate that at one point Jesus was a new kid in town, but a look at the end of the gospel would indicate that Jesus is not the new kid but rather the new king.

When we get to the Great Commission, we are told that all authority in Heaven and Earth has been given to Jesus. Therefore, we are to go out and do all that He has commanded. This is usually seen as something to give us assurance. As we go out telling the good news of forgiveness, we can be assured of the presence of Jesus. Now I don’t deny it includes that, but it is so much more.

The old rule of hermeneutics is that whenever you see a “therefore”, you’re to look and see what it’s there for. The text says it’s based on Jesus having all authority. All authority does not mean just to forgive sins. It means just what it says. Jesus has all authority. In an age where the disciples would have been well acquainted with Caesar and the Roman Empire, they were to know that because of the resurrection, Caesar was no longer in charge.

Instead, it is Christ who is the King and Christ is the one who rules from Heaven. His scope then reaches even further than that of Caesar and unlike Caesar, Christ is an eternal king. His throne can never be taken by another. All the Caesars would come and go. Christ would live on.

In fact, what is it that Christ tells the apostles to do? He tells them to do what He has commanded them. This is not a call to evangelism! This is a king giving marching orders! This is a charge going out that the world is to know that Jesus is in charge now and you are to be the bearers of that message! You are to go out into the Roman Empire and tell them Jesus is Lord!

Such a message would have been practical suicide, and if church tradition is to be believed, it certainly was. The Roman Empire would not have been happy hearing that they were no longer in charge. Jews would not be happy knowing nothing was said about returning them to the glory days of David and Solomon. We today consider it good news in our context. In their day, the news would have been news the people would NOT have been happy to hear.

And yet, that news still thrived somehow.

The Great Commission is still for us today and let us get something clear. Jesus is still king and He has given His orders. There is no other path that we are allowed to take. The king’s opinion is not up for debate. Many of us can hear the question about those who never heard. The best way to handle this is to make sure that they hear. We are told what we are to do. We are not told what happens if we fail in our mission. Christ has not given us a plan B. If He is our king, we are to follow His orders. If we are not, are we really seeing Him as king?

In Christ,
Nick Peters