Category: Evangelism

Ask The Pastor; Shouldn’t We Show More Love?

Dear Pastor,

In reference to your critique of Tullian Tchividjian a week or so ago I would like to make a couple of comments.

First, I find it amazing that you would cite Billy Graham’s visits with the presidents. Graham has made a conscious effort to be bi-partisan and non-political, something which cannot be said of many evangelicals today. Rick Warren tried that route and was thrown to the evangelical wolves.

Second, I remember someone saying once that it is easy to preach against sins that no one in your congregation commits. It is easy to preach against abortionists and homosexual marriage advocates.

The individual sinner (me and you!) however, are not brought under conviction for the sins of our culture. It is our sins: self-righteousness, unbelief, hatefulness, greed, selfish ambition, impatience, anger, holding grudges, having a sharp tongue (and pen), pride, and the like. Some of us commit acts of murder or sexual sins, as well. But the good news is not that we are sinners, it is that Christ came to save sinners.

Sadly, we have become not associated with Christ and his love for sinners, but the Pharisees and their condemning words.

David

Dear David,

Just a brief response seeking to help you see where you’re in error.

1.) Graham was hugely political. To sanction what US Presidents were doing by appearing with them was HUGELY political. Take only two examples.

a.) When he appeared with President Bush I in the context of Gulf War I, thus communicating the Evangelical approval. Instead Graham should have, at the very least, not appeared with Bush I since the Gulf war was naked aggression. Something no Christian had any business supporting.

b.) The 9-11 Memorial where Graham went all political by being part of a service that communicated that all religions are equal. A political statement if there ever was one.

Billy Graham was a political beast and there is no arguing that he was “non-political” and bi-partisan.

I always liked this quote from R. J. Rushdoony on the likes of Billy Graham.

The kind of religion Billy Graham … represents is readily approved of by corrupt politicians and venal communications media. It does not challenge their godless dreams of dominion, and it does sugar-coat their sins with the veneer of religious respectability, with a facade of pietism. Such men can have the ear of national leaders and preach in the White House and in Congress without affecting even to the extent of an iota the national march into degeneracy and apostasy.

RJ Rushdoony- God’s Plan For Victory

2.) Really? You think it is easy to make a public stand against Abortion and Homosexual marriages? You think Evangelicals in our congregations are not involved in those sins so that they don’t need to be addressed from the pulpit?

3.) Christ came to save repentant sinners. Christ did NOT come to save sinners who are not repentant. This is the problem with the antinomian “Gospel” of Tullian and (presumably) yourself. You think that repentant sinners and unrepentant sinners should be approached in the same way. Here are some words of Geerhardus Vos which might assist you,

“From the fact that to a generation which knew God only as a righteous Judge, and in an atmosphere surcharged with the sense of retribution, He (Jesus) made the sum and substance of His preaching the love of God, it does not follow that, if He were in person to preach to our present age so strangely oblivious of everything but love, His message would be entirely the same.”

Geehardaus Vos
Redemptive History & Biblical Interpretation
The Scriptural Doctrine Of The Love Of God

4.) All I see is self righteousness in the school which flings around the accusation of self-righteousness against those who hold up God’s standard. All I hear them saying is, “Look how much more righteous we are because we don’t expect people to have God’s standard placed before them, unlike those mean people who insists that the Gospel must be preceded by the proclamation of God’s Law word.

5.) I quite agree that all God’s people have sins to repent of. That is why, in our Worship every week, we hear God’s Law, Confess our sins, and then hear God’s declaration of absolution.

6.) David, you said, “The individual sinner (me and you!) however, are not brought under conviction for the sins of our culture” —- Where, pray tell, do you get this David? I am convicted daily.

7.) You seem completely blythe to the fact that there is a set agenda being pushed upon the Church and culture to normalize particular sins. It is not me who is making a hobby horse out of preaching against “Sodomy” or “abortion.” It is the fact that my people are inundated with the message that sodomy and abortion are “normal.” Ministers, preaching in this cultural context, are fools if they don’t take a stand, for the sake of Christ and His people, against those prevailing sins of the zeitgeist that are seeking to force God’s people to conform to the zeitgeist.

8.) In closing allow me to suggest that it is you, by offering the love of a harlot as the love of Christ, who is showing a lack of love to and for the sinner. The good news is that Christ came to save those who see themselves under God’s wrath because they are sinners.

You can be sure that when I am face to face with someone broken by their sin the last thing I will offer is condemnation. You can be sure that whenever I am face to face with someone who is repentant all I have to offer is the Character of God who loves us in spite of our sin. You can be sure that when I am face to face with someone who is repentant what I do is enter into repentance with them.

The Judgment & Salvation Of The Nations In Zephaniah

The book of Zephaniah prophesies against the Philistines,Moab, Ammon, Ethiopia, Assyria and Jerusalem (2:4-3:1-7). This teaches us that the judgment of the Day of the Lord will be TRANSNATIONAL. However, this TRANSNATIONAL judgment is not merely retributive. Zephaniah 3:8-13 reveals that salvation will come through this judgment: After the fire of Yahewh’s wrath in 3:8 there will come a day when those same nations who were judged will use their respective language to call upon the Lord to be saved. The “pure speech” (Zeph. 3:9) Yahweh gives to the peoples after judgment is for “all of them to call on the name of Yahweh.” So, judgment against Israel and Judah is to be followed by universal judgment against all the Nations at large prior to a universal restoration and recognition of Yahweh as the sovereign God over all the Nations.

God’s glory is thus seen in Salvation through judgment as He both judgment and salvation is visited upon the Nations as Nations.

Note here that in Zephaniah the judgment and restoration is not upon an amalgamated universal New World Order where all colors have bled into one. Zephaniah, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit sees God dealing with nations as nations both in judgment and in salvation.

Inspired by
James M. Hamilton’s “God’s glory in Salvation through Judgment.” — pg. 253

Predestination From Beginning To End … To God Alone Be The Glory

“When Paul was forbidden by the Holy Spirit to preach the Gospel in the province of Asia, and was given the vision of a man in Europe calling across the waters, ‘Come over into Macedonia, and help us,’ one section of the world was sovereignly excluded from, and another section was sovereignly given, the privileges of the Gospel. Had the divinely directed call been rather from the shores of India, Europe and America might today have been less civilized than the natives of Tibet. It was the sovereign choice of God which brought the Gospel to the people of Europe and later to America, while the people of the east, and north, and south were left in darkness. We can assign no reason, for instance, why it should have been Abraham’s seed, and not the Egyptians or the Assyrians, who were chosen; or why Great Britain and America, which at the time of Christ’s appearance on earth were in a state of such complete ignorance, should today possess so largely for themselves, and be disseminating so widely to others, these most important spiritual privileges. The diversities in regard to religious privileges in the different nations is to be ascribed to nothing less than the good pleasure of God.”

~ Loraine Boettner,
“The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination”

Note here, then, that God both sovereignly prepares a people as the receptive soil and then delivers the seed of the Gospel to land upon that soil that He had sovereignly prepared. All of this is of God’s predestinating Grace. Why should we think that God predestinates the casting of the seed without realizing that God has predestinated the receptivity of the soil even to the point of predestinating the very genetic makeup of those who would be receptive? It is still all of Grace and it is still the case that God alone gets the Glory. As Boettner writes above the discrimination between those who receive the Gospel and those who do not is — in every spiritual and corporeal detail — all of grace. If Macedonians as Macedonians were more favorable to the reception of the Gospel it is only because God predestined them in their whole being to be more receptive to the Gospel.

“Apart from this election of individuals to life, there has been what we may call a national election, or a divine predestination of nations and communities to a knowledge of true religion and to the external privileges of the Gospel. God undoubtedly does choose some nations to receive much greater spiritual and temporal blessings than others. This form of election has been well illustrated in the Jewish nation, in certain European nations and communities, and in America. The contrast is very striking when we compare these with other nations such as China, Japan, India, etc.”

~ Loraine Boettner
“The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination” (1932)

Let me just mention something interesting about this book as it pertains to race. When Boettner discusses race, which he does freely and fully, he does not stutter or blush as he writes. He also has the most annoying habit of referring constantly to “the white race” as if that were a real and meaningful idea instead of what all Cultural Marxists know it to be, namely a contrived pseudo-scientific neologism that serves only as a social construct designed for systematic theft and murder. Unconsciously, Boettner as a white man, will talk about the blessings of Christianity and the privileges of election in hearing the gospel, then will default to describing white culture and European settings. We see one example of that in Boettner’s first quote where he falls into talking about how Tibetans are less civilized because the Gospel did not take root in Tibet, whereas it did in Europe and America. (Remember though Boettner was writing in 1932.)

“A third form of election taught in Scripture is that of individuals to the external means of grace, such as hearing and reading the Gospel, association with the people of God, and sharing the benefits of the civilization which has arisen where the Gospel has gone. No one ever had the chance to say at what particular time in the world’s history, or in what country, he would be born, whether or not he would a member of the white race, or of some other. One child is born with health, wealth, and honor, in a favored land, in a Christian home, and grows up with all the blessings which attend the full light of the Gospel. Another is born in poverty and dishonor, of sinful and dissipated parents, and destitute of Christian influences. All of these things are sovereignly decided for them…”

Lorraine Boettner
The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination

God chooses the Elect from the inside (otherwise known as genetics), AND from the outside (otherwise known as the environment), and then chooses to send His Spirit to open their eyes to see what they never could see apart from the Spirit and as depending only upon the fallen basis of both genetics and environment (nurture and nature).

Hat Tip — Ed Waverly

With A Half-Twist

A reductio on an article that ran in a Reformed Denominational magazine. As originally published it found the word “homosexuality,” or “gay” wherever you find the word Necrophilia in my reductio.

by Name withheld

February 21, 2014 — I am a Christian. I was born and raised in a Reformed Church and educated in its schools from kindergarten through college. I am also a Necrophiliac. These two characteristics define my life more than anything else: more than my education, career, marital status, or the number of children I may have.

As a Necrophiliac Christian, I am an oxymoron to many.

I do not easily embrace myself as a necrophiliac man. I’ve only come to do that after many years of wrestling with the Scriptures, with God, with myself. I sought counsel from pastors and Christian therapists, tried ex-necrophiliacs for Jesus ministries and every reparative therapy program I could find. I begged God to change me and in despair attempted suicide. I studied every angle of the questions “How do I become ‘not necrophiliac’?” and “What must I do to love alive people?” In my study of Scripture, I wrestled with the passages interpreted to condemn Necrophiliac behavior, with creation order, the nature of sin, and the process of sanctification. And I prayed. My sexual orientation did not change.

Like every other Necrophiliac person in my Reformed denomination, I am mindful of my church’s understanding of Necrophilia. “Love the sinner, hate the sin” is a cliché implying that I am sin personified. Tony Campolo has observed that Jesus says the opposite: “Love the sinner and hate your own sin. And after you get rid of the sin in your own life, then you can begin talking about the sin in your brother or sister’s life.” Obviously therefore it is wrong for any sinner to denounce necrophilia as aberrant. I wish the Church would learn that. After all, the Church is full of sinners just like me. Our sins may vary but since we are all sinners no one should be allowed to denounce another person’s “sin.” (Unless of course we are denouncing the sinners who denounce other people’s sins or when we are denouncing Necro-phobia.)

Meanwhile, where have all the necrophiliac sons and daughters of your church gone? Many—I dare say most—have left your churches and your hometowns. Their church home became unsafe when they—like me—learned the pastor’s response to people like us.

It may surprise you that there is a deep spiritual longing within my necrophiliac friends, a longing and a struggle to reconcile “Jesus loves me, this I know” with an attribute that many in the church consider an abomination. My friends grew up loving God—that has not changed. But as a result of being rejected, many have given up on the church, and, tragically, on God.

The culture has is sure to change. Necrophiliac marriage is sure to become legal in Canada and in some states. The U.S. Supreme Court will one day surely strike down any laws forbidding necrophilia. The Boy Scouts of America one day will have special merit badges for sharing a sleeping bag with the dead. I foresee the day when celebrities, athletes, and business leaders will “come out.”

The church seems unprepared to respond to these situations legally and with moral authority. How do congregations pick up the pieces of shattered families after the failure of mixed-orientation marriages of necrophiliac people who enter into a heterosexual marriage, believing that it would make them acceptable to God and the church? How do they welcome necrophiliac couples who attend services or who wish to be married in the church?

My understanding of the Scriptures has changed dramatically over the years. If “insanity” is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results, I was going insane seeking “freedom” from being a necrophiliac. Jesus confronted me with the words “I have come to give life and life abundant” (John 10:10). These words trumped “abomination theology.”

Coming out has not been easy—for me or for my family. But it has brought life.

Isn’t it time for the church to welcome back its necrophiliac sons and daughters, along with their spouses and children? Isn’t it time to encourage everyone to know the love of God for each and every one of his children?

Review Of Rushdoony’s “The American Indian” — Medicine Men

“True medicine men, it was said, had given way to the white man’s doctor because he knew more than the Indian practitioner…. [The older Indian men] had no loyalty to the old ways per se. The white man’s gun was far superior to the bow and arrow. Why not his medicine also?”

R. J. Rushdoony
The American Indian

In this brief chapter RJR gives a few anecdotes about his experience with Indian Medicine men as well as what he learned from Indian elders.

“From their (older Indian men) perspective, there were no medicine men on the reservation — only fakers.”

However, according to Rush’s account there were Indians who were what we would call Natural-paths and homeopaths. Rush mentions one particular gentleman who could identify every plant in the area as well as the medicinal purposes that those plants might have had. This reminds us that allopathic medicine does not have all the answers that it pretends to have. Indeed, there are times I wonder if allopathic medicine shouldn’t be viewed as alternative medicine in favor of a more homeopathic path.

Still, despite this natural-pathic skill RJR reports that the Indian,

“liked modern conveniences and advances, including modern medicine.”

Rush reports this because the Federal Government, during the New Deal, sought to re-Indianize the Indians and as such encouraged the Indians to go back to their ancient ways. Rush writes,

“They [the Indian] had no loyalty to the old ways per se…. they did not identify their Indian-ness in terms of artifacts, and it annoyed them when others did…. They saw nothing exclusive about the benefits of the white man’s civilization …. In brief, these old men liked modern conveniences and advances, including modern medicine…. they recognized and appreciated the advantages of modern medical practice, of nurses and hospitals.”

Rush does not again the failure of the State in terms of medicine,

“They [the Indians] knew that the agency doctors were often inferior to the doctors outside of the reservation….”

The immediately above quote is important because it reminds us again that whenever the State involves itself so that people are required and forced to go to them for any service the consequence is a lowering standard of quality of whatever service the State has seized. The Indians that RJR came in contact with in his Reservation ministry were forced into a governmental health care system and as such the Doctors that they had to deal with were inferior to Doctors operating in the supply and demand market. This is an observation pregnant with meaning as the citizenry today in our country are inching towards the kind of Socialized medicine the Indians had forced upon them. Our quality of medical care will be inferior just as the Reservation’s medical care was of lower quality.

Rushdoony returns to the medicine man issue by noting that what passed as the medicine men, in his observation, were, for the most part, dabblers in peyote.

“What then of the so-called medicine men practicing at that time? Most were peyote leaders. Peyote was administered as a holy, healing medicine. It tended to paralyze the digestive tract, or at least deaden it to pain, I was told. The patient felts no pain and assumed that he was being healed.”

Rush notes that such patients of the peyote practitioners would often finally fail and at the last second would give up on the medicine man and go to the hospital, despite the warnings of the medicine man against the hospital. Often when such people finally went to the hospital they quickly died because of the previous neglect. Upon their death, the peyote medicine men would then claim that the death was the result of giving up on the medicine man and going to the hospital.

RJR ends this chapter by admitting that there were a few other types of medicine men who were not peyote playboys. Rushdoony suggests that these “healers” were in fact, demonically enabled.

“There was another kind of practitioner. How deep his roots were in Indian history, I do not know…. These medicine men, if they could be called such … I would call occultist. They had strange powers I cannot explain. One of them … could pick up a rattlesnake, chant to it, hang it around his neck and not be bitten…. [Medicine] men such as A.C. were Indian in a fanatical way: they sought to blot out the world of the white man.”

RJR notes that as Christianity waned after WWII occultism increased. He notes that only the Gospel of Jesus Christ can counter such occultist practices and muses that,

“When men turn their backs on Christian civilization, see only evil in it, and try to abstract Biblical faith and morals from themselves and the world, are they not courting the demonic.”

This is an important word for our church and culture today. In many many places in the Church today churchmen are turning their back on Christian civilization, and indeed see only evil in the idea of Christian civilization. Indeed we are everywhere seeing the attempt to abstract Biblical faith and moral from silly conceptual paradigms like Natural law. One can only wonder if such churchmen are courting the demonic by turning their backs on Christian civilization.