An Autistic Christian Responds to Greg Locke

Am I demonized? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

There are a number of pastors that really don’t belong in the pulpit. One example is someone like Greg Locke. He’s done such crazy things as burning Twilight and Harry Potter books. (I personally don’t mind burning Twilight books, but it’s not because they have vampires in them.) I have had brought to my attention recently how he said that children can be demonized based on how they act, but the doctor calls it Autism. I finally found a clip of it being used here.

So let’s start with some points of agreement.

First off, I do fully agree that God can heal people. If God wanted to heal me of my Autism, He can do that. God can bring people back from the dead and create a universe from nothing. Healing someone of a condition is child’s play. The same can apply to OCD or Down’s Syndrome or cancer or any other condition.

Second, I do agree that if a child is having problems in the church, parents should try to do something and I would add that they should work with the church staff so that everyone involved can have a better experience. Some children on the spectrum could have some sensory issues. I remember when I was a child, I never liked it when our pastor got in the center of the stage and started yelling.

But let’s get to the real deal here.

Locke makes claims such as saying that words like Autism show up nowhere in the Bible. Sure. So what? I interact with JWs who tell me the word Trinity shows up nowhere in the Bible. Somehow, we got this silly idea that only words that show up in the Bible are acceptable to use. Am I to think that cancer, influenza, polio, and other diseases don’t exist because those words aren’t used in the Bible?

Locke also says he’s not saying a child who is said to be autistic is demon-possessed, but that they could be demonized. As the video above asks, what is the difference? The most could be one is being controlled and one is being influenced. For parents who are struggling, Locke adds to their burden by saying demonic activity is responsible for their child’s experiences. Are they to think that they don’t have faith then?

Now I know I have said to not talk about one’s own self so much, but when it comes to autism, I think that is different. After all, if I am going to give the perspective of a Christian on the spectrum, the one I know best is myself. I will then talk about what it is like, the good and the bad both.

I became a Christian at the age of 11 when I heard the gospel at a Baptist church. The Bible shaped my life and I was always in church thanks also to the influence of my parents who raised me Christian. My parents never had to worry about me behaviorally. No illegal drugs. No going out partying. No alcohol. No porn. Not even profanity. While I am divorced now, I stayed a virgin until I married and I aim to remain chaste until I remarry.

I struggle sometimes still with interactions and I was thankful to find gamer friends in school that I could unite with. Video games and games like that have been a bonding tool for me. I went to Bible College after high school and came to develop a love for Christian apologetics that I discovered there.

I knew I wanted to go to seminary in North Carolina, yet I lived in Tennessee. I also knew how protective my parents were and that I would have to convince them I could live on my own. Thus, I went out apartment hunting secretly and one day, came home and told them I put money down on an apartment. I was going to live on my own for a year and then work on getting into seminary.

I moved to seminary with a friend named David from Missouri and apologetics became a way also that I met people, though in my cases, I relied on David for social guidance. I did marry and I can say my wife was a calming influence on me in many ways. I have written enough about the divorce before and I don’t want to say more about it.

I moved back in with my parents and knew I wanted to finish my Master’s. Thus, I applied for New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary where I had spoken before. This would be the furthest away I had ever been from my parents and on my own, aside from my cat Shiro who sits behind me on my laptop carrying case as I speak. I am working on a Master’s in Philosophy and plan to get a PhD. My plan now is to study on video games and Christianity and our need for a quest.

There are benefits of being on the spectrum. My mind can be a virtual encyclopedia able to churn out random trivia facts easily. I love doing difficult mathematics in my head. My Dad sometimes contacts me about a word game he plays where you have to unscramble a seven-letter word and he can just tell me the letters and I can do it. I also have a great ability to multi-task. I will play a game here at home while watching videos on YouTube, usually something educational. I am reading through multiple books at the time in addition to what I have to read for school.

I also enjoy humor. Students on campus know me well as a cut-up where they can come into the post office on campus where I work and I can immediately say something humorous. It is especially funny for me when I take people literalistically. There are a number of professors who get in on my jokes as well and I love to see people leaving the post office laughing.

This is not to say there aren’t difficulties. I hate small talk. My therapist and I have decided humor is actually my small talk. I can very easily miss social cues and I don’t know when to tell if someone is joking or not a number of times.

I also can have a difficulty expressing myself and my own wants and desires. If I am at the Wal-Mart for instance and I want to get a divider in the check-out line so I can put my own stuff down, I cannot seem to be able to say the words “Excuse me. Can I get a divider?” I normally speak with gestures a number of times if I don’t know someone well.

This also makes dating really hard. How can you tell if a girl is interested? I don’t know. How do you express your own desires and overcome speaking barriers when you want to ask someone out? Don’t know. I realize other guys struggle with this, but guys on the spectrum struggle more.

I don’t understand how other students interact and how friendships are formed. When I go to a church service and I see people just communicating with one another, I don’t understand what’s going on. I hate it when people come up to me and just touch me, even if it’s something like a pat on the back or something. I remember a therapist once asking me “How would you like to respond when someone does that?” and saying “A judo toss would be nice.”

I know my diet is very limited due to my being on the spectrum. When other students enjoy crawfest here where everyone has crawfish, I go because I try to step out of my comfort zone, but it is a nightmare experience for me. I try to avoid going into the cafeteria when meals are going on.

But you know what? Generally, I am thankful for my life and being on the spectrum because I want to be a blessing to others. I have been told that at the next Defend, I will be speaking not just on video games and Christianity, but also Autism and Christianity. I realize I am high-functioning, but I want people to know Autism is not a death sentence.

My mother and I sometimes talk about how doctors long ago told my mother that I would be bound to her for the rest of my life. I would never go to high school or graduate or live on my own or drive a car or go to college. Nope. None of those things. My parents refused to accept that. I refused to accept that. Being a gamer, I learned to push myself and face challenges. Today, I live over 600 miles away from my parents working on my Master’s and driving my own car and working at the seminary post office.

No, Pastor Locke. I am not demonized. I have struggles like everyone else does in many ways. I have some struggles unique to my condition, but also, I wouldn’t want to be cured of this condition. I like the benefits I have from it.

As for my own Christianity, I would tell you to listen to people who have heard me from the pulpit before. I am sure many of them would tell you of a guy who loves his God and wants to tell the truth of Christianity. You would see in me a guy who wants to do everything he can to help out his fellow man and can’t stand to see someone needlessly suffering. You would see someone who wants to bring joy to others, but at the same time for those I trust, someone who is deep and real with his own pains, hurts, and insecurities.

No, pastor. My behavior is not the result of demonization. When I do act in ways I shouldn’t from my condition, I do stress that autism can be an explanation for why I do things, but if they’re wrong, it’s not a justification. I once again ask that people work with me. Thankfully, I have found people online and offline that have been working with me.

Speaking of online, I also want to stress that the internet has let people like me find their voice. I still get terrified at the thought of face-to-face evangelism, but put me behind a computer screen and I take on anyone I can. That also includes expressing myself in this blog.

Step down, Pastor Locke, and give your position to someone who is more worthy. Give it to someone who truly understands the flock and seeks to love the flock. Give it to someone who will not go to struggling parents and weigh them down even more.

There are plenty of people out there like that. They won’t be hard to find.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

 

So How Do You Apply A Sermon?

What role does application play? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Yesterday, I wrote on problems with sermons. I do want to respond to some objections and concerns that I saw expressed online about this. So let’s begin.

First off, I hope we can all agree on something. Sermons should present God in Christ to the people. If a passage is about what Jesus did, such as calming the storm, we should emphasize that first. If we jump straight to “Jesus can calm the storms in your life” we miss the revelation of God in Christ and we miss more importantly how we can know Jesus can do that.

Our great danger today often is we seek to apply the text to us immediately. The question often pops up of “What does this text mean to you?” The first question is simply “What does this text mean?” We don’t spend enough time with the text trying to understand it and the situation it was written in.

It is a mistake to make the sermon be entirely application. Do that, and all you’re giving is advice and Jesus is secondary to that. It is also just as much a mistake to say that there is no mention of personal application. However, as one reader simply put it in a forum I’m on, you give the message of Jesus and then say “Therefore….”

Consider Romans. When do you get in to a lot of matter dealing with how one should live life? It starts largely around chapter 12. What were the first 11 chapters doing? Explaining Paul’s theology and doctrine. What about 1 Cor. 15? We have a glorious chapter on the resurrection and how death has no hold on us. Then what follows? Paul says “Now there’s an offering we need to gather for the people in Jerusalem.” There’s a reason he waited until after talking about the resurrection.

I am also not saying stories can never be used. What I am against though is pastors that seem to talk more about themselves and their experiences than they do about Jesus. This is a danger since so many of us love to talk about ourselves. There is a time and place for that. When talking about Jesus, put Him primary though. He must become greater. We must become less.

Stories can be a great way to draw people in if done right. If you can tell a story that relates to something many people have experienced, that will reach more people. I will have more luck talking to the average crowd about say, The Princess Bride, than I will about Final Fantasy IV. Now if I was at a gaming event, Final Fantasy IV could be a much better usage then.

Let’s consider a favorite misused passage. Jeremiah 29:11. No. This is not about you. Stop putting it on graduation cards and everything else. However, can this passage have a personal application? Yes. Let’s suppose I was preaching a message on this text. I might say something like this.

“Judah had been called to be the people of God. They had seen Samaria go into exile judged by God, and yet they persisted. Now Jeremiah was telling them they were next. They would go into Babylon. The people of Judah could think that was it. Their story was done. What about the covenant promises? Had God abandoned His people?

No. God tells them to work and live and have families in the city of Babylon and pray for its success. They would continue to be a people there. Their story was not done. God had not forsaken the covenant, but He was enforcing the punishment of it, but when the time was ready, the people would come back.

God assures them He has plans for them. He will give them hope and a future. He is in charge of the story still. It is not Babylon. It is God.

Friends. We don’t know the plans of God either, but we do know as Christians, His goal is to conform us to the likeness of Christ. What God does as Romans 8 tells us will work for our good if we love Him. We too can go through times in our lives when it seems like we are abandoned by God, but we must be faithful and live our lives for Christ wherever we have been placed. The story is never out of God’s control. All will be made right in the end.”

In doing this, I have presented the historical context of what has happened. I have also presented a theology. God is the God of covenants. He is also the one in charge who knows the future. We also know from the text that God does love us still and wants to conform us to the likeness of Christ. When we are in trying circumstances, we need to hold on in trust too because God is a God who keeps His covenant. If He keeps it even when the people are unfaithful, how much more will He when we strive to live in faith?

Note also that none of this was highly in-depth. I doubt it would really go over your heads if you heard it in a sermon, but odds are you don’t. You need to.

The danger is that if all we have is application without a basis, that won’t be enough to act faithfully. Lauren Winner in her book Real Sex: The Naked Truth About Chastity said that when a boy and a girl dating are on a couch together and the hormones start screaming, a few verses from Paul won’t work. You need a whole theology that tells you why you save sex for marriage.

There are a number of churches that are wanting to bless same-sex unions and say homosexual practice is fine. Why have so many Christians bought into this? A lot of them don’t have a theological backing. They don’t understand the Bible, how we got it, how to read it, or theology and ethics. These are things that we should not be teaching just the academics in our churches. We should be teaching this to everyone. Sure, some people will excel at this, but everyone needs at LEAST the basics.

Pastors. There is plenty of meat in the Scripture for your congregation. Share it with them.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

Pastors. Consider This For Your Sermons

What are some things I would like changed in sermons? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

As readers should know, I am in therapy here recovering from my divorce and learning social skills for dating. My therapist was asking me about how I’m doing spiritually and one thing we talked about were sermons I attend. I mentioned some concerns I have with them and I would like to write about them now.

The first point I want to make is that too many sermons seem to focus on the experience of the pastor. I get especially concerned when I hear them talk about things that God told them. Those are dangerous words. That is giving divine authority to whatever you say next. Are you willing to do that? While I realize we don’t live in Old Testament times, in those times, the penalty for saying “God said” when He did not say was death. We can say that that won’t happen anymore, but are we to think God doesn’t still take seriously people claiming to say what He didn’t say?

I often hear people who give announcements at church say the same thing. “Well, God brought in enough money for us to do XYZ” or “God laid it on our hearts to build the new building” or “God put this idea in us for the new Vacation Bible School.” How do you know? I always want to ask that question. It’s not just a Protestant thing. I have heard it in Catholic and Orthodox churches as well.

Pastors. If you spend too much time on your experience, you will be the focus. It will not be what the church is to do in Christ. It will be about what you think Christ is doing in you. I don’t come to church to hear about you. I come to church to hear about Jesus.

Second, is that too often we focus on application which boils down to advice. I am not saying application is not part of a sermon, but it should be the minimal part after the main message has been given. Lewis once said the world is full of good advice and if all Jesus came to do was give us good advice, it was a wasted effort. We have rejected much advice before. Why not the best of all?

If this is all we do, then we are not different from many other groups except we sprinkle a little bit of Jesus in there to sound spiritual. We’re pretty much a club at that point. Now I get that part of coming to church is community and we should have that, but the main draw should not be community. The main draw should be Jesus.

There’s a reason we have negative terminology for preaching and a sermon. If someone starts telling us what to do over and over we say “Don’t preach at me” or “I don’t need to hear a sermon.” Those are negative terms and really, they’ve been sadly earned. If you’re a pastor, do you want your sermon to sound like that?

Finally, present the grandeur of God in Christ in all your sermons somehow. For instance, when I was at church Sunday, the sermon I heard was on Mark 4. What’s it about? Jesus calming the storm. You know what we too often make the sermon about? Jesus can calm the storms in your life!

Well, yes, He can. But He won’t always. However, before saying that Jesus can calm the storms in our lives, let’s look at what this text is actually about.

Jesus calming an actual storm.

I’m going to wager a hunch that very few of you reading this have successfully gone outside to face a horrendous storm of some kind and calmed it down by your words alone. I’ll even say most of you have never attempted such a thing before. Who are we to calm storms, after all? Yet Jesus did it!

What does that tell me about Jesus? What does that show me about who He is? What does that tell me about the power that He has?

Another passage like this is David and Goliath. The passage becomes about facing your giants. What are the Goliaths in your life? Can you take them down? Let’s look at what the story is about.

It’s about the covenant God of Israel having a faithful servant in the next king, David, who trusts so much in YHWH to fulfill His covenant promises if one is faithful to Him that he is willing to face the giant on this God’s behalf.

The story of the three Hebrew boys thrown into the fire is about three Hebrew boys being faithful to YHWH in a pagan kingdom against a pagan king not even knowing if they would be spared. The miraculous preservation of them showed that yes, God can deliver, but it also showed something else. God is superior to the will of the pagan kings.

We could go on and on easily. In all of these stories, by jumping to application, you miss the message. Do you think Mark really wrote the story of Jesus calming the sea to show that God can calm the storms in your life? No. He wrote it to tell us about Jesus.  The writer of Samuel did not write to tell us God can overcome your Goliaths. He wrote to tell us about faithfulness to YHWH by David in a time when Israel was under oppression by an evil foreign adversary.

The story of the Hebrew boys was not written to show God can deliver you from your furnace. It was written to show that God was faithful even in a foreign land and greater than the gods of the most powerful empire on Earth at the time. It was written to show His covenant had not been abandoned.

Think back to a time when you fell in love with someone. Did you need to hear advice about how to love them? Not saying it wouldn’t have helped, but generally, when you were presented with the loved one and who they were, you wanted to do the good automatically. There’s a reason the saying was that the face of Helen of Troy could launch a thousand ships. Present a man with the beauty of the woman and he will tend to want to do great things. Beauty is very inspirational.

What will a man do when presented with the glory of Christ?

Now if you want to say God can calm the storms in your life and other things, make sure that is secondary. The primary thing is what God has done in Christ and in the lives of the saints of the past. Present them this God that they are to trust in and if God calms the storm, great! If not, He will be with them through it.

For those of us who are Protestants, we stand on a treasure trove of great theology. I am part of an Aquinas Zoom meeting on Thursday nights and I hear good theology as we discuss what Aquinas says about God. That’s our theology also. The Reformers and immediate predecessors would have no problem with much of medieval theology. It’s only in more recent times that we started having people seriously question simplicity, impassibility, omniscience, etc.

We have a great God. Let people see Him. We have a great savior in Christ. Let people see Him.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

Visiting A Black Church

What’s it like in a black church? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

In trying to see how different people do worship, I had brought up the idea to my pastor of going to a black church which he thought would be a good experience for me. This morning I went to one. It’s been the first time I’ve been checked at the door, along with everyone else, to see what my temperature was.

When I went in, one of the first things I noticed was a picture hanging right above the pulpit that was of John the Baptist baptizing Jesus. The picture was quite colorful and stood out. I also saw something on the wall about Covid Busters which surprised me as well since most churches don’t want to have anything remotely political in the sanctuary. There was also an American flag standing in the sanctuary.

There is an amazing unity in the place as well in that everyone seems to know everything that is going on and the mood will switch from a quiet solemnity to a sudden jubilation apparently seamlessly. No one can say that the black church is lacking in excitement when they get together for worship. Also, this is a group that I can tell strongly emphasizes community.

When the time came for giving, there was a great excitement at that. I know God loves a cheerful giver, but I did not understand what was going on. I have seen too many churches where that seems to be the emphasis a lot of times. I’m not saying that was going on here, but I do see that happen often.

The sermon was certainly full of a lot of passion. I didn’t really agree with what was said in the interpretation, but the excitement was present and the congregation would often join in response. As I said, the black church emphasized community greatly. I do think that is something that is lacking in many churches I have been to.

I can also say I was the only white person in the room, but I don’t think anyone treated me any differently because of it. I was just another attendee that day. I had someone come up and give me a pin with a pink ribbon on it that I saw was for something with I think health awareness, which I had no problem wearing while I was in the congregation.

The service was also longer than many others that I have been to. I saw on the website that I needed to be there at 9 AM and I don’t think we got out until it was 11 AM. Most churches I have been to have had the whole service last for an hour at the most.

The worship style wasn’t for me, but I was thinking about how it is great that we serve the same Jesus. Racial issues often come up in our context and for a Christian, we should remember that we are all one in Christ. If you think we have a race problem, the best way to deal with it is to spread Christianity. Now that is not the reason to spread it as Christianity is not to be a means for a political end, but it is a result of it.

We’ll see where I go next week.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

 

Book Plunge: Conceived by the Holy Spirit

What do I think of Rhyne Putman’s book on the virgin birth (Which I do affirm)? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Rhyne Putman is a good friend of mine and he was fine with sending me a review copy of his book on the virgin birth (Which I do affirm). If you want to read it, you will be waiting awhile as it comes out next year. Still, I wanted to write on it while it was fresh in my mind.

This book covers most every area of the Gospel narratives on the virgin birth (Which I do affirm) and not just defending the doctrine, which needs to be done, but even more important after that, showing what difference it makes. Is it just a nice add-on to the story but if we lose it, no big deal? Not at all, says Putman. We need to look at the difference it makes to know that Jesus was virgin born. (Which I do affirm.)

Also, if you’re reading this and you’re a layman thinking “Great. Another academic work that will go over my head” then you are also mistaken. This is written for you. This is easily approachable and Putman explains his terms well. Not only that, but it’s perfect Christmas reading seeing as there are 25 chapters in this. Gather the family around and read one chapter a day and you can go through December 1-25 celebrating the virgin birth. (Which I do affirm.)

The first section of the book deals with the birth of the virgin-born king (Which I do affirm) in the narratives. Each part is looked at in detail and also specifies which objections are being answered. Want to look at something on the Lucan census? Go straight there! Want to see if the incarnation goes against pre-existence? You can find it! Want to just look at one particular part of the narratives, say if you’re a minister preparing a sermon? Not a problem! Go to it!

Part two then goes beyond this looking at the practice of the doctrine. Putman will take you through the church fathers to see what they say. (Also, Protestants like myself really do need to read the church fathers. The Reformers pointed to them regularly and it’s a shame that many in our churches don’t even know who they were.) He then goes through church history seeing what so many people said about how the doctrine applies to them. There is definitely a heavy Christmas theme here as many of the chapter headings refer to Christmas carols. Again, you can also go through and see objections that need to be answered, even the one that says Mary should have aborted.

Finally, he does have an appendix for those who are interested, on the Marian dogmas, particularly perpetual virginity. Putman walks a fine line here as he wants to make sure he is charitable to scholars who are of a different persuasion than he is whom he has learned much from. I hope that those who read through such a section, like Roman Catholics and Orthodox, will walk away saying that their position was treated fairly and even though they don’t agree with Putman, that he made his case and respected theirs.

Putman’s book is a delightful tour through the Gospels and through church history. If you want to bless your Christmas celebrations, get this book. Go through it. If children are old enough to understand the terms about virginity and other such ideas, have them join in. If you want to establish a new Christmas tradition, then let it be this one.

And on a side note, Putman is also definitely right about one other thing. Die Hard is indeed a Christmas movie.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

 

Getting Your Opponents Right

Are you representing them correctly? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

There’s a rule that on April 1st, everyone checks everything that is said or shared on social media. This is a day of tricks and we want to make sure we’re getting our information right. Who wants to be fooled?

Compare this with, say, a political season. In the past, the main thing to watch out for doctored pictures. Now we’re going to have to start looking out for deepfakes. I remember I used to have to send out corrections in email blasts when I would get an email about the latest thing Obama had done years ago, except, well, he hadn’t done it. I couldn’t stand what he did to the country, but I sure wasn’t going to have him misrepresented.

Why? Because I want to defeat my opponent in truth, not in falsehood. I want to make sure I am representing them. I want to know their position enough that if I had to, I could argue for it myself.

I’m in a Facebook group for Christians and Jehovah’s Witnesses to debate. What are the kinds of arguments I see? Why is Jesus praying to Himself? Don’t you know that three does not equal one? Look at these pagan triads!

Over and over, myself and others say that these are not what we believe as Christians. We are not claiming that three = one. We are not claiming that Jesus is praying to Himself. The whole thing about the Trinity from paganism is just bad information, but I threw it in to show the bad research done.

Something I tell these people arguing against the Trinity is that if you care about truth, you want to make sure you’re not just getting your views accurate. You want to make sure you’re getting the views of your opponents right. That’s part of caring about truth. It doesn’t mean you think they’re right. It means you care enough about them and their positions that you want to get them right.

I see plenty of Christians arguing against evolution and saying “If we evolved from apes, why are there still apes? This is treated as a major defeater when most every evolutionist out there knows how to answer that. I’m not saying there aren’t good arguments against evolution. I’m not saying there are good arguments against it. I’m saying that this is a bad argument against it. You can disagree with a position and think some arguments against it are bad. You can agree with a position and think some arguments for it are bad. There are some theistic arguments I will not use since I don’t think they work.

If I was arguing against Muslims and kept telling them that the Koran says XYZ, and they kept telling me “No! That’s not what it means!” wisdom would tell me that after awhile I should go and check and see if I am reading it right. It would be easy for me to look at what agrees with me. No. I need to go to their sources and see. Believe it or not, I don’t use the argument that the Koran itself denies the crucifixion because a Christian book I read on the Koran once gave an argument that shows the Koran really isn’t saying that. I can’t in good conscience use that argument. If a Muslim, however, argues against the crucifixion, then I can indeed say it’s fair game and make my case, but not because I think the Koran teaches it didn’t happen, but because my opponent thinks it didn’t.

I’ll also let readers know I am always reading something from a position that I disagree with. I am going through at least one book that is like that constantly. I also make it a point to not dismiss the book.

For instance, in a Mormonism debate group, there was a Mormon who recently shared something from Bart Ehrman. Too many Christians were apparently saying that he was an apostate and all this other stuff. Even saying that, what matters is his data. Meanwhile, too many Mormons say that the material they are arguing against is from anti-Mormon sites and sources. What of it? The data is what matters.

I don’t know if this is accurate or not, but I remember years ago hearing that it was a medieval rule that in a debate, you couldn’t respond to your opponent’s argument until you were able to phrase it in your own words to his satisfaction. How many of our debates would be better with this simple rule? Such a stance would actually make you have to think about your opponent’s position and reason through it on your own.

Also, if you think a position can be defeated by simplistic sayings, it is most likely you have not understood it.

For those of us who are Christians, we claim to be people of truth. Everything that we talk about should be about truth. This means not just what we believe, but what our opponents believe. In a sense, if we misrepresent them, to some degree, we’re misrepresenting Christ.

Let’s not do that.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

Book Plunge: Why Christians Are Wrong About Jesus — Isaiah 9:5-6

Do we have the correct interpretation of Isaiah 9:5-6? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

We return now to Campbell’s book and we’re looking at this passage in Isaiah. Campbell argues that the child in the passage is Hezekiah. Does he have a case here?

Not really. Isaiah 7 is the one that starts all of this off with the Syro-Ephraimite war. Judah is being told that they need to join in to resist Assyria and if they don’t, the other nations will destroy Judah. Isaiah tells Ahaz to not worry about the situation. The whole plan will fall apart and Judah will survive.

Ahaz is highly resistant to this and Isaiah tells him to ask for a sign and Ahaz says “No! I will not ask for a sign!” Isaiah then says that he will get a sign anyway. The virgin shall be with child! While this is a prophecy of the virgin birth, which I do affirm, the immediate context is not about the virgin birth, which I do affirm.

The point of this prophecy is that the child will grow up and before he is done being weaned, the whole coalition will fall apart. The virgin in this case is the wife of Isaiah. She would have a child and the prophecy will be initially fulfilled.

Here then is a reason why this cannot be Hezekiah. Hezekiah was of the lineage of Judah and Isaiah would not be giving birth to a king like that. The child is instead Maher-Shalal-Hash-Baz.

Campbell doesn’t really give much of an argument, but since I have said that this is about the virgin birth, which I do affirm, I should further expand on my position. The child in the case of Isaiah was never named Immanuel. Jesus was said to be Immanuel in the New Testament, meaning God with us. This could be an inclusio with bookends of the Gospel being “God With Us.”

The virgin birth, which I do affirm, is a greater fulfillment that was meant to be

for the whole of the House of David. The greater evil to be dealt with is the evil of sin. The prophecy points beyond the immediate situation and goes to a far-distant future.

Jesus is the one that is also truly God with us. Also, keep in mind that the writers of the LXX saw this as referring to a virgin by their usage of the word parthenos. Jesus is the true hope of Israel in the end and the one that is the ultimate sign of the person of God being with us.

The other part of this chapter is a look at Daniel 9. There is a lot that is said I understand in the appendix and I have not got to that point yet so we will get to that at a later date. It is a complex issue.

We will next time be looking at the effect of Paul on Christianity which I have a lot to say about. We’ll deal with that then.

And I affirm the virgin birth.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

Do You Think About The Roman Empire?

Is the Roman Empire really on your mind? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

We all know the joke going around the internet now about how often men think about the Roman Empire. Before I heard it, I couldn’t tell you how often I did, but I am sure it was frequent. I am reading the letters of Seneca right now for one and if you study the New Testament, that kind of coincides with the Roman Empire.

I also have a friend who says he thinks about Christendom instead. Yes. We should think about that, but at the same time, I do think that while this is all funny, there is something true here. We need to think about the Roman Empire.

The Roman Empire at the time was the most powerful empire in the world. Rome was the eternal city. At its peak, it would have been suicide to have messed with it, and yet now, it’s gone. It’s a study of ancient history.

To be sure, it has left its effects behind. Many of our legal categories still come from the Romans today. We also do have the wisdom of the Romans such as Seneca who I mentioned as well as writers like Marcus Aurelius and Cicero and others. We can think of plays such as Julius Caesar. We can watch movies like Gladiator.

This is also the empire that God chose to have Jesus be born in and to be the birthplace of Christianity. Christianity grew and thrived in this empire that for all its nobility, was also quite immoral in many areas. Do I need to remind us of Nero who even had his own mother killed?

Also, Christianity arose in an empire where it was heavily persecuted. Sure, it wasn’t constant, but there were many emperors who held persecutions to try to eliminate Christians. We in America can be thankful that at least so far, we haven’t had the military of the nation go on a crusade to try to kill Christians.

In the end also, Christianity won the day. The empire actually became Christian. Unfortunately, too little, too late. It fell anyway, but the Christianity remained. No. Contrary to the thought of many, there are several problems with the idea that this led to a period called the “Dark Ages”. Christianity was still thriving.

So why do we need to think about the Roman Empire?

First off, this is a point of history and we need to learn from it. We need to see what people did back then and how they lived back then. Our ancestors were not idiots. They still have truths they can teach us.

Second, politically, we in America can think we are an invincible empire, but we are not. We need to see why it is the Roman Empire fell and what we can do to make sure it doesn’t happen here. Those who think they are too big to fail, too often do.

Third, we need to learn about how to spread Christianity. The earliest Christians spread throughout the Roman Empire without aid of technology like we have today, be it cars, planes, or media through the internet. They did more with less. Can you imagine how Paul would be using the internet if he had it available today?

Think about the Roman Empire. We should. Learn the history of it. Respect it, but also learn from its experiences. Those who do not learn from history are condemned to repeat it.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

Visiting A Deaf Church

What’s it like going to a deaf church? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Yesterday, I went to a church in New Orleans for the deaf. I did let them know early on that I can hear and for a time, I was talking some since the person I was speaking to could read lips, but then I was speaking too fast so they brought in an interpreter. There were some people at the church who could hear as well, such as the pastor’s wife. When people came and talked to me, they always started with including sign language until I told them, “I can hear and I can’t read sign language at all.”

On my way there, I was thinking about how much we take hearing for granted. What would it be like to live in a world without being able to enjoy music, for instance? I saw they said something about video phones instead of just regular smartphones which left me wondering if there’s a special tool that is available for the deaf so they can use phones. Of course, we use our phones for so much more than phone calls anymore that it doesn’t surprise me that the deaf have phones.

While the deaf can’t hear music, there was still music. It was done by a lady on a screen who would sing and sign at the same time, though I’m sure the audience wasn’t joining in. There was a time for prayer requests and I was surprised to hear updates on previous prayer requests. I don’t think this happens a lot of times in our churches.

The pastor gave his sermon and he signed it entirely while his wife spoke aloud what he was saying. Had that interpretation not been going on, I know I would not have understood any of it. I remember talking to my mother the night before on my Echo who was asking me how I would be able to understand the message. I then explained I didn’t understand it in the Vietnamese and the Chinese church either. (And for that matter, the Arabic church.)

There were also people who were shown on a screen joining in on Zoom. Overall, this was still a small congregation such that I completely passed the church on my first time going by as it looked just like any other small building. I had to go and repark my car at one point because it was too far away from the side of the road and someone was nice enough to help spot me as I left seeing as I had to back out, something difficult for me with the steel rod on my spine.

I am here now thinking that I really need to be able to appreciate more and more that I can hear, which is something we take for granted. At the same time, I am thankful that many in the deaf community are still clinging to Jesus. I sit now and wonder that could it be for some of them, the first sounds they will ever hear will be the words “Well done, good and faithful servant?”

I can’t think of anything that would be a better first sound to hear.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

Book Plunge: Why Christians Are Wrong About Jesus – Psalm 110:1

Will Jesus have His enemies made a footstool for His feet? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Campbell now goes to Psalm 110:1, which leaves me actually thankful I read the anti-Trinitarian book recently since Campbell has many of the same arguments. He says that the problem with Jesus’s usage of this against the Pharisees has a number of problems. The first is that this is assumed to be a Messianic prophecy. The second is that the second person is known to be God. The third is that everyone would have agreed on this.

The simple counter to this is that these are also assumptions. For one, I have no reason to trust Campbell on his statements on what is and isn’t a Messianic prophecy as he has presented no source whatsoever. Second, there is no interaction with any scholarship on New Testament interpretation of the Old Testament. The third is that Jesus could not have presented any new insight whatsoever into the text.

He says the second word for Lord is Ladonee. I have open my Logos and not knowing that word, I have typed in Adonai and brought up the word as well as the Hebrew spelling. I have done this with a number of other Hebrew words. I have done this with Ladonee and nothing has come up. The best guess I have is that there is some form of punctuation that Campbell has translated a different way that no one before has done. If anyone has information otherwise, I am open to it.

He does say this is to a person of higher status, but never YHWH. Even if I granted that, in a sense, that should not surprise me as very rarely are two persons spoken of as YHWH in the same text in the Old Testament, though it is not unheard of. However, if someone is a higher status, it’s easy to say that God would qualify as a higher status than David. It would be a strong problem to the Pharisees to hear Jesus say “Okay. David has a son, but the son of the greatest king of Israel is actually superior to David. How can it be? How could the Messiah be greater than David?”

Again, Campbell also assumes the ignorance of the authors of the Gospels thinking that they just had the Septuagint and then figured the Hebrew must have both words necessarily referring to God. There is no indication that the writers would want to consider what the Hebrew said just because they are trying to convince their audience of something. This is especially the case if they know that there are people who are Jewish who are going to be reading this material.

Thus far, it looks like if anyone is ignorant of the material, it is actually Campbell instead. Campbell likely has simply read some anti-Trinitarian arguments, perhaps from Jewish counter-missionaries, and has not gone and bothered to see what others say. (Remember, there is no interacting with Michael Brown.) I have said many times to beware of the sound of one-hand clapping. It’s easy to sound convincing when you only give your argument.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)