Can Non-cultic Cultures Exist?

Sean offered,

Well, if there is a religious agenda attached/implied in the educational system it does not therefore establish an argument for a christian theistic system but rather an argument against any kind of cultic religious system.

Culture is ALWAYS a reflection of the cultic religious system of any society. You cannot have culture without cultic religious systems. Culture always descends from what a people think about God. Hence, cultic religious systems are inescapable categories that cannot be avoided. You cannot build a common realm that is sanitized of the gods. Christians may disobediently decide to hold Christ’s Lordship in abeyance in the common realm but that does not mean that the adherents of other systems will not press for the advance of their gods in the putatively common realm. The idea that there exists a realm that is not beholden to and derivative of some god or god concept wherein his or its adherents do not incarnate their worship as a substance called culture is the very pinnacle of foolishness. Indeed the pluralistic culture that those who hold to such a ‘idea’ want to see built would be a self-defeating testimony to their own attempt to build a non-cultic culture, as the State would have to play God among the gods to make sure that all of the gods kept their place.

The argument that humanistic secularism qualifies as an religious worldview doesn’t work. The existence of Hindu, Islamic, et al cultic transformative religious theocracies is simply another argument against any cultic theocratic society this side of glory.

Asserting that humanism doesn’t qualify as a religious worldview is just an assertion. With the God as the State implementing positivistic notions of law while hiring priests (teachers) to catechize the youth in Government Churches (schools) and providing the sacrament of social security # as a counterpart to Baptism where a child is united with ‘God’ and voting as a counterpart to communion where the participant is united to God by way of a ritual act, Humanism certainly qualifies as a worldview. Any contention that it doesn’t is just a case where ideology trumps reality.

The bigger question is this; if God created/recreated the “city” outside of Eden (the judicial mandate against Cain but limiting retributive justice) or the recreation of the world post noahic deluge. Is not the non-cultic city good?

The non-cultic city didn’t look so non-cultic at Babel.

Scripture teaches that Satan is the God of this world which I understand to mean that Satan is God of the present wicked age that is in opposition to the age to come which Christ has brought. If Satan is God of this present wicked age then clearly this present wicked age, having a god (which is no god) is a cultic city that stands in opposition to the age to come that Christ has brought with its own cultic character. Christ has in principle destroyed this present wicked age and His people live out that victory in obedience to His Kingship.

To say that there is a non-cultic city is to say that there is a realm where neutrality obtains. Not true.

It may not be holy, but it is established and bound(beginning and end) by God Himself(or was God just providing the “church” an antogonist?). And if it(the city) is God’s and therefore good, who are the transformationalists and theonomists really at odds with?

If this present wicked age is to be overcome by the age to come which has already, in principle overcome it, then who are the R2Kt virus people really at odds with?

Packing Them In

Recently, I wrote about some unique ways that Churches were seeking to draw people to their services. If you will recall I drew attention to local services that included a ‘Jesus Christ Superstar’ sing-along Good Friday service as well as Lottery Easter Sunday at a local Pentecostal Church. This week I learned that another Church in another State did a ‘U2’ Good Friday sing-along service, and our local pentecostal Church once again held its Easter Raffle.

However, the big news about how to build a Church comes from the Lutheran Missouri Synod denomination this morning. It seems that some bureaucratic Lutheran got the idea of giving 25,000.00 to a program where billboards were used to help grow an area Lutheran Missouri Synod Church. These billboards were hot red in color (you know… the color of the devil) and all were signed by Satan himself. They had messages like (I’m not making this up) ‘JeffersonHills Church Sucks,’ and ‘Boycott JeffersonHills Church,’ and other witty, ‘that will cause them to flock to the Church’ maxims.

Now, as anybody recalls these are just a play off the earlier billboard signs that had the signature of God affixed to them with other brilliant statements coming from God like, ‘Loved the Wedding, Invite me to the marriage,’ and ‘As my apprentice you’re never fired.’

What I want to know is if we are going to make billboards quoting these beings why don’t we make billboards with actual quotes?

We could have God saying on a billboard

“I hate workers of iniquity” — God

or

“I made Him who knew no sin to be sin for sinners.” — God

There is plenty of room on a billboard for those quotes.

All of these cutesy billboards, all of these Holy services dressed in unholy sing-along garb, and all of this church growth stuff is geared for people who will never be disciples via the means offered by Church growth gurus. Even the Grand Guru of Church Growth finally admitted that,

“Some of the stuff that we have put millions of dollars into thinking it would really help our people grow and develop spiritually, when the data actually came back it wasn’t helping people that much.” Bill Hybels

Further, these church growth ideas are produced by people who never have been nor ever likely will be disciples of Christ. Disciples of Christ don’t come up with humanistic sociological techniques to grow Christ’s Church.

Ever since Seminary when I was first exposed to this bilge, I’ve been asking one question that has never been answered.

How is it that a set of techniques that could as equally grow the 1st Church of Satan as it does the 1st Church of Christ be theologically neutral in what it does?

Is the only difference that we Christians have good intentions while those people at the 1st church of Satan don’t?

Let’s face it, when using humanistic church growth methods succeed in ‘growing’ a Church and are pursued in conjunction with an emasculating of the Gospel message (and the two usually go together) the result is not a Church but a ‘hangout’ where people can go to find dates and get some occasional good advice from the relevant talk.

This Church growth stuff lowered my GPA in Seminary because I wouldn’t buy into it then and it still makes me ill today.

There goes that golden career opportunity

This morning I learned that it is dangerous for a pastor’s career aspirations to publicly record his convictions on a website. It seems that once people know what you believe it will limit the options for career moves that one might have otherwise had if they had not foolishly placarded their convictions for the world to see.

I’m not sure why a minister would want a pulpit that they gained by hiding their convictions but apparently that is what a wise person does these days. I guess that maybe it’s something like a political candidate running for a political office. A candidate may have their convictions but the last thing in the world they want to do is allow those convictions to be widely known for if they are widely known then the people who don’t have those convictions will be against them. Better to run a campaign where you keep everybody guessing about what you really believe, for in such a way you theoretically garner more votes. I think they call it being a ‘stealth candidate.’

Zoinks Batman… what has it come to when ministers are thinking of their careers in the way that politicians think about their campaigns?

The Church & Cultural Transformation

I’ve been pretty sick the past few days, and it may be that I am still suffering from fever induced delirium, but I woke up this Lord’s Day morning with ‘transformation’ on my mind. The Church’s drive for cultural transformation is quickly becoming the generational hobby horse du jour. It seems that large swaths of the Church wants to be part of bringing transformation to our culture. Many want to follow ministerial Hollywood types like Rick Warren who could say,

“I am praying for a second reformation of the church that will focus more on deeds than words. The first Reformation was about beliefs. This one needs to be about behavior. … We’ve had a Reformation; what we need now is a transformation.”

Obviously, Rick Warren is no theologian since change in behavior never comes without a prior change in belief. Also, Rick is no church historian if he believes that the Reformation only brought about a change in belief and not a change in behavior.

Still, despite Rick’s vacuous utterances, I am a believer in the Church’s role in cultural transformation. I believe that the church and the culture will be transformed as the Church teaches what its beliefs are. I believe that ‘as goes the Church so goes the culture,’ or ‘the Church is the leading cultural indicator.’ The problem the Church has though is that it must realize that not all cultural transformations are equally valid. The agenda for cultural transformation is one that is shared by almost all ideologies and psuedo-Churches. The Marxists, cultural marxists, feminists, homosexuals, globalists, the religious right, the religious left, libertarians, communitarians, all desire cultural transformation, and all work towards that end. Now as most expressions of the Church have become captive to the reigning ideologies of the moment what ends up happening is that many Churches put a candy coating of spiritual Jesus talk over their approaches to cultural transformation and call that Biblical transformation, and then pursue their pagan transformation agenda claiming that they have the authority from Jesus in their pursuits.

This is why Churches must know what they believe and why they believe it and what they don’t believe and why they don’t believe it. Pastor’s and Elders, being grounded in Scripture, must have the ability to critically examine the theological foundation upon which all cultural movements are based. If they fail to have the capacity to distinguish correctly they will inevitably seek to transform in a anti-Christ direction, all in the name of a foreign Jesus.

So, the first hazard in the Church’s role in cultural transformation is that the Church may start transforming, in a well intended but naive manner, on the basis of the doctrine of demons and not on the basis of the doctrines of Christ.

Perhaps, because of the prevalence of this first hazard a second hazard has arisen in the bowels of the Church. This second hazard seeks to eliminate the problem of the Church grabbing on to the wrong transformation agendas by insisting that the Church isn’t called to the work of transformation at all. M. Scott Horton, for example, can write,

“There is no call to cultural transformation in the New Testament. Yet if Christian churches are fulfilling their specific mandate and believers are being built up in the faith and practice through the Word, we can expect to see distinctive effects in the culture.”

One wonders what the difference is between cultural transformation and seeing ‘distinctive effects in the culture?’ Does Mike believe that it is acceptable for the Church to bring ‘distinctive effects in the culture’ as long as those distinctive effects don’t transform culture? The problem though is that any ‘distinctive effect’ that alters something in the culture that wouldn’t have been altered without that Church inspired ‘distinctive effect’ is transformation.

It seems at some level Mike understands that it is impossible for the Church not to be a transforming agent. Paradoxically enough, even if the Church were to succeed at not being a transforming agent it would at that very moment be transforming the culture if only because its refusal to bring its theology to bear on the culture would allow other theologies to gain positions of transformational ascendancy. A church that retreats from seeking to transform the culture is actively involved in transforming the culture in a non-Christian direction, if only because a theology that teaches transformational neglect allows room for pagan theologies that inspire pagan transformation.

So, what we have established so far is that church inspired cultural transformation is an inescapable category and that many Churches are transforming in a non-Christian direction, all the while claiming Jesus are their inspiration.

I Said, Hey Babe… Take A Walk On The Wild Side

“We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honor and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and then bid the geldings to be fruitful.”

C.S. Lewis

http://www.breitbart.tv/?p=69323

Why should anybody be surprised by this? I would be surprised if it didn’t happen.

We make girls without scruples and expect of them virtue and modesty. We laugh at sexual propriety and are shocked to find teenage whores in our midsts. We morally lobotomize and then bid little girls to be morally thoughtful.

Secondly, you have got to know if it is going on in Dallas it is going on all over the place.

Look, we communicate in our government churches (schools)

1.)That sex is no big deal

2.)That if education has a primary purpose its primary purpose is to make money.

These girls were just being consistent with the presuppositions that they were taught in school as reinforced by our culture.

What I don’t understand is why the sheriff is so mystified.