Proclaiming the Resurrection

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America, Atonement, Christianity, Easter, Gospel, Hope, Jesus Christ, Progressive Christianity, Religious Left, Resurrection, Salvation, Secularism, Truth

Easter brings us the joyful proclamation of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, the good news of salvation for all who trust in Him.  The Church is commissioned to share this word, and we must beware the world’s temptation to water down, re-direct, or alter the message.  A couple of prominent politician’s takes on Easter, this year, underline how readily this happens in our culture.

            President Biden gave an opinion piece Religion News Service, ‘Let us recommit ourselves to the lessons of Easter’, notable more for what it neglects than for what it says.  Most significantly, President Biden makes no mention of the resurrection of Jesus Christ—which is quite odd for a supposedly committed Catholic, but explained by the fact that what he really wants to talk about is not Easter but COVID and other national issues.

            “Easter is a time to celebrate the spirit of renewal and the promise of brighter days to come”, he begins, which is true if you supply all of the unspoken context about the atoning death and victorious resurrection of Jesus Christ, the fact that the spirit of renewal is the Holy Spirit, and the cosmic realities of Christian eschatology.  Without that context, such vague words of hope are banal and even deceptive.

            From there he expresses grief regarding the loss of the COVID pandemic, leading to the statement that “the traditions of Holy Week remind us of the journey from sorrow to salvation—that faith, hope and love can lead us out of the darkness and into the light.”  Once again, an allusion to the meaning of Easter that could be stretched to fit the gospel with enough interpretive gymnastics—the three theological virtues characterize the work of the Holy Spirit in the redeemed by their union with Jesus Christ—but, much more likely, point to a vague sub-Christian spirituality whereby we may save ourselves through virtue.  Faith, hope and love do not lead us out of darkness; Jesus Christ, the light of the world, came into our world to lead us out of darkness and bring us life.

            More about COVID follows, pointing to how things are better and calling people to help those in need and get vaccinated.  Towards the end he says, “As we commemorate this holiest of days, let us recommit ourselves to the lessons of Easter.  Let us love and care for our neighbors—as Jesus did, and as we’ve seen so many ordinary, extraordinary people do over the course of this difficult year.”  That is the sole mention of Jesus in the article, a typical liberal reduction of His mission to the moral influence of His compassion.

            Whereas President Biden’s piece is notoriously vague and neglects to mention the resurrection, more directly anti-gospel is a tweet that has gained some notoriety, by Rev. Raphael Warnock, Baptist minister and recently elected Senator.  Warnock tweeted, and since deleted, as reported in the Christian Post:

“The meaning of Easter is more transcendent than the resurrection of Jesus Christ,” Warnock wrote on Twitter Easter Sunday.  “Whether you are Christian or not, through a commitment to helping others we are able to save ourselves.”

            That is a direct denial of the gospel of Jesus Christ.  He does not oppose or neglect the resurrection, but he attempts to ‘transcend’ it—to humanistic works-based salvation.  If this is, indeed, Warnock’s belief (one news report claimed to have a source informing them it was written by an assistant), then he is not a Christian.  The message of Easter cannot transcend the resurrection of Christ; it centers upon the resurrection of Christ.  The message of Easter cannot point to salvation by our good works; it is precisely the message of salvation by Christ’s righteousness imputed to us, of His atoning death and vindicatory resurrection.

            Easter is a message of hope, precisely because it is a specific and definite message and precisely because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.  To make it a humanistic message is to reject the world-shaking significance of what God has done, and tragically miss the offer of forgiveness, redemption, and eternal life.

The Wonder of the Cross

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Atonement, Christianity, Cross, Crucifixion, Easter, Good Friday, holiness, Jesus Christ, Love, Progressive Christianity, Redemption, Religious Left, Salvation, Theology

“For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes” (Rom. 1:16, ESV).

On Good Friday especially, we ought reflect on the meaning of the cross.  Why did Jesus die?  What did His death accomplish?  What is the message of the atonement?  Only when we will face the awful reality of sin can we grasp the magnitude of Christ’s accomplishment on the cross, and the wonders of the holy-love of God.

I mentioned recent statements by Jory Micah in my last Tuesday Tea-ology, but it has come to my shocked disbelief attention that not everyone drinks tea.  Now, you can watch Tuesday Tea-ology without drinking tea, but, to be on the safe side, I’ll restate the issue.

Jory Micah considers herself a theologian, and she has been intensely criticizing the idea of hell.  This, then, connected with criticism of the orthodox position on the atonement—because the wrath of God and the meaning of the cross are intertwined.  When you deny the wrath of God, you lose the significance of the cross, as Micah demonstrated.

In one tweet, she said:

“Jesus died because the empire murdered Him for standing up for what’s just. God didn’t kill Jesus and Jesus didn’t even “have to” die to inspire many to live for God.”

She makes two statements here, both of them problematic.  In the first place, she asserts that Jesus was executed by the Roman empire because of His stand for justice.  You can see how such a narrative would resonate with contemporary American culture and its fixation on heroic activism; but it has no basis in the biblical record.  The empire appears to have taken no notice of Jesus; the Roman governor is only triangulated into the business of Jesus’ trial because the Jewish leaders lack the authority to arrange an execution, and Pilate only gives in to the demand because of political pressure.

In the second place, she denies the divine purpose in Jesus’ death, but even in doing so reveals that she’s not even thinking in terms of an objective atonement at all.  Jesus’ death wasn’t necessary, she contends, in order for us to have Him as an inspiring example.  No, I suppose not; but, since the purpose of Jesus’ death was so much more than inspiration, the argument is rather toothless.  And, as a matter of fact, Jesus’ death is a prime example of the wonder of God’s love.

Micah also retweeted someone else, with the handle Pope Carmine Naugahyde, who asserted,

“Jesus didn’t die for our sin. He died BECAUSE of it.”

Now, this is, perhaps, closer to the biblical doctrine of the atonement, in that it at least recognizes that Jesus’ death was particularly related to human sin.  But it does so in a way that directly contradicts the true meaning of the cross.  The implication of the statement is that Jesus’ death was the result of human sin, but that His death was not intended to deal with human sin—it was not atonement at all.

But the Scriptures won’t support such anthropocentric exegesis.  There was, indeed, a divine purpose in the death of Christ.

“For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures” (1 Cor. 15:3).

“so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him” (Heb. 9:28).

Jesus died for our sins, to take them away, to deal with them.  Dealing with sin meant paying the penalty for sin—suffering, on our behalf, the wrath of God.  That is what He did upon the cross, as the prophet Isaiah foretold:

“But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed” (Isa. 53:).

This is the message of Good Friday.  God, in the vastness of His holy-love, has dealt with our sin.  In the unfolding of the Triune mystery of salvation, we witness the depths of divine love turned upon us: the Father sent the Son, by the Spirit, to bear the wrath of God in our place so that we could receive forgiveness, life, and adoption to sonship unto God. The glory of the atonement can only be grasped by those who acknowledge the holiness of God, the depravity of sin, and the condemnation under which we stand apart from Christ.  Facing the terrible seriousness of our situation, we are able to see the work of Christ and the offer of salvation for what it is: the awesome redeeming majesty of the holy-love of God.

Tuesday Tea-ology, 03/30/21

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Atonement, Christianity, Cross, Crucifixion, Eternity, God, Good Friday, Gospel, holiness, Jesus Christ, Liberalism, Love, Progressive Christianity, Religious Left, Salvation, Theology, Truth, Tuesday Tea-ology

Tuesday Tea-ology today looks forward to Good Friday. At the cross, God in holy-love atoned for our sins, so that we could have eternal life.

Max Lucado’s Problematic Apology

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Christianity, Culture, Culture War, Emotivism, Epistemology, Language, LGBTQ+, Max Lucado, Postmodernity, Progressive Christianity, Religious Left, Rhetoric, Truth

            The furor over Max Lucado’s remote preaching for the Washington National Cathedral has caught a fair amount of attention lately.  That Lucado met disapproval from some in the Episcopal church for holding elements of a biblical sexual ethic is as expected; that he was allowed to speak at all is rather surprising, and that those responsible have come to regret it is unsurprising.  But probably the most troubling part of the whole episode is the apology letter Lucado issued afterward.

            His opening paragraph suggests already a misapprehension about the seriousness of defying God’s design for the human person and relationships.  An orthodox Christian preaching to the Washington National Cathedral is undertaking a prophetic task.  This is, indeed, a “high honor”, but not, I think, in the sense that Lucado intends.  Prophets aren’t supposed to hear with dismay that their presence has been “a cause of consternation” to people who reject God’s Word; they’re supposed to expect it.

            Lucado identifies the source of this consternation, a sermon from 2004, and proceeds to apologize.  It is a good apology in that it owns responsibility without making excuses.  But what is he apologizing for?  The hurtfulness of his sermon.

            Here I must allow for the possibility that Lucado has something to apologize for.  I don’t know; I haven’t seen the whole sermon.  He thinks he was disrespectful, and I respect a man regretting being disrespectful.

            On the other hand, it seems far more probable to me that the consternation towards Lucado resulted not from how he communicated the truth, but from the truth itself.  Looking at the snippets of the sermon available in the various articles about this kerfuffle, one finds that Lucado, if not entirely on point with his inferences, was at least significantly less severe in his remarks about homosexuality than the Scriptures are (see Lev. 18:22; Rom. 1:26-27).  Apologizing for oneself is one thing, but we must never apologize for what God has said.

            God has said that He created mankind male and female, distinct and complementary, intended for union in this complementary distinction in covenant sexuality (Gen. 1:27; 2:23-24).  Lucado perhaps apologizes for this, certainly obfuscates it.  He refers without qualification to “the LGBTQ community”, “LGBTQ individuals”, “LGBTQ families”, and “LGBTQ people”, accepting these significations that frame homosexuality et al as a legitimate and morally neutral identity category instead of a rejection for God’s design for humanity.

            “Faithful people may disagree about what the Bible says about homosexuality,” Lucado says.  Granted that true Christians can misinterpret the Bible in all kinds of ways, his words in this context surely imply more than that.  If I said, “Faithful people may disagree about what the Bible says about theft,” would I not be suggesting that the Bible’s teaching about theft is unclear?  So also the teaching of Scripture about human sexuality; the question is not whether it is possible for a true Christian to misunderstand, but whether God has spoken clearly.

God has spoken clearly.

            To his credit, Lucado does not himself reject the Bible’s teaching on homosexuality, and he is willing to say so here—here, where it will probably nullify his apology, because that biblical teaching is the very thing that so consternates those to whom he is apologizing.  But he includes that pesky adjective “traditional”; if he had only said ‘the biblical understanding of marriage’, and left it at that!  Christians must all come to realize that framing it as the ‘traditional’ understanding of marriage is a concession, a way of putting it positively while granting legitimacy to other understandings of marriage.  If you must put an adjective before marriage, ‘real’, ‘true’, or even ‘biblical’ are all acceptable qualifiers; ‘traditional’ gives too much away.

            All this obfuscation is wedded to the basic burden of the apology, addressing the ‘hurt’ his sermon of years ago has caused.  Here it is an exquisitely contemporary apology, of the kind we are used to seeing from a variety of public figures who have said something of real or perceived offense.  Whether what Lucado said was true or not, biblical or not, appears irrelevant; it was ‘hurtful’, and that is what matters.  For a telling comparison, just look at the similarity between Lucado’s apology and Dean Hollerith’s apology for inviting him to preach.  Both have feelings firmly behind the steering wheel, and truth in the back seat—politely observing the injunction against back-seat driving.  Both suggest a therapeutic model of truth—the kind of conceptual world in which the ubiquitous contemporary sentiment ‘my truth’ is, if not coherent, at least at home.  The locus of morality is not in the voice of God coming to us from without—‘what has God said?’—but in the inward response—‘how did it make me feel?’

            Such a therapeutic model of truth is utterly opposed to the Christian faith.  Christianity has, at its center, the gospel: the wondrous message of the saving life, death, resurrection, ascension, reign, and return of Jesus Christ, and the offer of redemption to those who repent and believe.  This message comes with a conviction of the fiery holiness of God and the wickedness of our sin.  We dare not trade the clarion call of the gospel for a soothing affirmation of every man’s sense of self.

            Lucado allows for differing interpretations of the clear teaching of Scripture regarding human sexuality, adding, “but we agree that God’s holy Word must never be used as a weapon to wound others.”  We have met this before, this strange surprise that the sword of the Spirit might prove sharp and pointed.  Of course, we must not twist the Scriptures out of spite towards others.  But where the Word of God cuts truly, we must not attempt to blunt its edge.  The surgeon’s scalpel cuts to heal; the holy Scripture convicts to save. Some things ought not be apologized for.

A-woman Again

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Christianity, Culture, Feminism, Gender, God, Progressive Christianity, Religious Left, Sexual Revolution, Society, Theology

Representative Eric Swalwell has drawn a little attention from an incidental remark wherein he referred to God using the pronoun ‘herself.’ This sort of blasphemy is not surprising on the cultural left–and blasphemy it is, to willfully feminize God, who has always revealed Himself in masculine pronouns–but it is an instructive reminder of what lies at the bottom of the sexual revolution. This ideology is not, at the last, about freedom or love or individuality; it is about idolatry.

It’s easy to see the sort of logic that might push someone on the religious left towards feminized deity: it’s all about power dynamics, and deity is seen as the highest glass ceiling. How can any woman really get to the top if, ultimately, He is at the top? So feminist theology has, for some now, pursued the quest for a goddess. We see this in academia, in iconography, and, as in the present case, in popular culture.

This is all part of the project of self-actualization, self-centering of the sexual revolution. All obstacles to our freedom are to be abolished. With abortion, it manifests in the denial of responsibility for the life of the child which impinges on our freedom; with divorce, denial of the covenantal union which threatens to make us for-another and united-with-another instead of with and for ourselves; with promiscuity the barriers to self-centering are obvious, and so also with the whole LGBTQ+ alphabet. But feminism, remarkably enough, is what takes the project to its fullest extent.

By feminism, of course, I do not mean what feminism might have once meant (and still touches on in some ways): contending for the simple truth that women are fully human, equal in value and dignity, responsible moral agents. By feminism, I mean what mainstream feminism now is and has long been: a project of revolt against God’s good design for man and woman. In this sense, it is an arm of the sexual revolution, and plays a major role in the revolution’s cultural advance.

But a revolution revolts against some authority or power. Who is the sexual revolution in revolt against? Not ultimately, as its footsoldiers might believe, oppressive patriarchy or antiquated norms. It is in revolt against God, who created man and woman, who created human sexuality, and who has established its nature, purpose, and the good boundaries that allow for true freedom and flourishing. The sexual revolution is merely one particularly consuming aspect of mankind’s rebellion against the maker–and we see this, in stark clarity, with the feminist attempt to feminize God. For while the sexual revolution in its manifold aspects attacks the dignity and identity of men made in the image of God, this final expression of feminism goes after the God in whose image we are made.

All of this is sobering to observe. But do not lose heart. There is good news–very much, very good news.

In the first place, God is invincible. He cannot be disfigured. In His great forbearance, He permits blasphemy for awhile, but idolaters cannot tarnish the glory of the Holy One. God will vindicate His honor, in His time; at the last, every knee shall bend, every mouth declare the Lordship of Jesus Christ.

In the second place, God does forbear, and idolaters of every sort are invited to receive the amnesty of the Almighty. By faith in Jesus Christ, those who scorn God now may yet come to know Him as Father, and the wonderful privilege of adoption as His children. It is not too late.

A fundamental choice is laid before all of us, a call to repentance, with the wonderful promise of restoration, redemption, and resurrection. We may know God–not just abstractly, but personally; not just as the Father, but as our Father. But we may only know God on His terms, not on our own. We may only know Him as He has revealed Himself–as He truly is, not as we would have Him be.

Knowing Him a He truly is, we also come to know ourselves as we truly are, and in sanctification we embrace the selves that He has called, and empowered us, to be. This self is not self-centered but Christ-centered, renewed in the image of the Creator. There, unsurprisingly, lies the secret of creaturely joy.

An Easy Question

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America, Christianity, Culture, Culture War, LGBTQ+, Progressive Christianity, Religious Left, Secularism, Society, Tolerance

Jason Jimenez, writing in the Christian Post, asks a question both pointed and quite easy to answer, “Why does the media give a pass to Biden’s faith?” The question might be more broadly applied, as Jimenez does, to the better part of the cultural and political left. In an era where consistent Christian beliefs are frequently tarred by the left, and a particular season where a wide variety of orthodox Christians are being painted together with the pejorative label ‘Christian nationalism’, why is Biden’s professed Catholicism, not only personally but in his politics, so gushingly held forth?

The answer, again, is rather obvious, and Jimenez knows it: Biden is advancing the leftist agenda. While some on the cultural left object to Christian faith per se, the more usual objections are to the Christian worldview and its whole outlook on human flourishing–particularly, in recent times, to the Christian teaching that mankind is made up of men and women, who are neither changeable nor interchangeable. Opposing this worldview calls for championing secularism and labeling Christians as dangerous, nationalists, bigots, and so forth.

But when you find political champions who claim Christian allegiance but promote your secular pluralistic worldview, that’s a different story. Now you have an avenue for claiming that Christian faith is consistent with the sexual revolution and its anthropology–which is what the religious left consistently provides. Not everyone in the cultural left will like it; as Religion News Service recently observed, “Secular groups praise Biden’s agenda but express concerns about religious rhetoric“. But you’re advancing the secular policies. At the end of the day, as Rachel Laser of Americans United is quoted in the article, “actions are so much more important than words”. As long as its just ‘religious rhetoric’, not actually an applied Christian worldview, its fairly tolerable to the hard secularists, and useful to the religious left in general.

In the end, the common ground between leftist disdain for the Catholic identity of Justice Barrett and promotion of the Catholic identity of President Biden is the advance of secular ideology. Reaction to Christian identity is conditioned on whether the professed Christianity is challenging or bolstering the secular worldview.

Is there a hypocrisy and inconsistency at work? Of course. But is there anything surprising or hard to understand? Not at all.

Vain Aspirations and Kingdom Culture

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Abortion, America, Christ, Christianity, Culture, Culture War, God, Idolatry, Pluralism, Poetry, Prophecy, Religious Left, Secularism, Society

            For the inauguration of President Biden a few weeks ago, a poem was read by Amanda Gorman, Youth Poet Laureate, entitled, “The Hill We Climb.”  Leaving literary criticism to others, I wish to reflect upon a single line in the poem: “Scripture tells us to envision that, ‘everyone shall sit under their own vine and fig tree, and no one shall make them afraid.’”

            The Scripture is Micah 4:4.  Here the prophet is describing divine deliverance in the last days, and the context is extremely significant: what the “Scripture tells us to envision” is the exaltation of the one true God, figured in the elevation of His holy mountain (v.1), and the universal dissemination of the knowledge of God (v.2), and—in such context—universal peace and prosperity (vv.3-4).  It is, indeed, a wonderful eschatological vision, and we would do well to envision it.

            But it is not a vision consonant with the cultural headwinds of contemporary America.  The glories of the prophesied epoch are both consummated by and built upon the exaltation of the one true God; God’s glory founds, surmounts, and surrounds all the delights of the age to come.  The prophesied peace and prosperity does not crown a culture of pluralistic idolatry—there are other prophecies for that (e.g. Micah 5:10-15).  Sitting under one’s own vine and fig tree (v.4) comes together with a universal pursuit of God’s will, “that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths” (v.2).  It is absurd to envision this future while—to allude to just a couple of policy objectives of the incoming administration—denying God’s design for humanity and destroying innocent human life in the womb.

            That is the great dissonance that echoes behind the selective appropriation (?!) of the divine promises in the context of idolatry and immorality.  As reported by Alexandra Desanctis in National Review, “Sponsoring a Flag at Today’s Inaugeration Sends a Donation to Planned Parenthood.”  Does a civics that alludes to the worship of Molech reasonably expect the blessing of Yahweh?

            The proper application of this observation is to remember that eschatological vision prescribes present faithfulness.  Micah 4:4 in the context of America today is a call to repentance.  The age to come comes by the glorious work of the child born in Bethlehem (Micah 5:2), not by any labors of ours, and certainly not by secular pluralistic ideologies.  There is a present foretaste and an ultimate fulfillment of this promised peace and prosperity—for all who will have it.  But, for a culture chasing idols, all such aspirations are vain.

            For those who will have it, there is another culture, within and without the cultures of this world; there is a kingdom ever advancing, life-giving, loyal and good.  For those who belong to that kingdom, and hope to inherit its promises, it is imperative to live in its culture.  Without withdrawing from the world, while still pragmatic in politics and active in society, the people of God can inhabit the culture they long for in the present.  That, I suggest, is the way forward in 2021 and beyond.

“In the Name of…”

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America, Christianity, Culture, God, Government, Idolatry, Pluralism, Progressive Christianity, Religious Left, Secularism, Society, Truth, United Methodists

            I mentioned a couple of days ago the silliness with which Rep. Cleaver ended his prayer for the opening of congress on Sunday, and I certainly wasn’t alone in observing the nonsense of it.  But that little detail has gotten more attention than the fact that the prayer was problematic in more significant ways.  How we end our prayers matters, but may not matter as much as the basic question of who we are praying to.

            I am no connoisseur of congressional prayers, and would be unsurprised if they were blasphemous as a matter of course; I make no claim that Cleaver’s prayer stands out from the pack (though it might, for all I know).  But the ending has claimed so much attention that we might as well draw people’s eyes up a few lines from “amen and awoman.”

            You can view the whole prayer on C-Span (there’s also a transcript, but it is both incomplete and unreliable).  And the prayer is not all bad, as concerns its content: there is humility, and an expressed desire for unity (if rendered somewhat incredible by the prayer’s conclusion).  But the question of great concern is, to whom is he praying?

            Towards the beginning, he invokes, “Eternal God,” which is an acceptable, if not explicit, Christian address.  He says, “The members of this august body acknowledge your sacred supremacy,” which seems to me unlikely, but we shall return to that.  Various phrases biblical and Christian phrases suggest that it is the one true God whom Cleaver addresses—without ever bringing in any of the key terms, such as “Jesus,” “Holy Spirit,” or “Trinity,” that might really seal the deal.  Nonetheless, one is left with the impression that he might actually be praying to the actual God—and making the audacious claim that the U.S. congress operates in submission to the Holy One.

            But, at the end, he concludes, “We ask it in the name of the monotheistic god, Brahma, and god known by many names, by many different faiths.”

            Beg pardon?

            It would appear that Cleaver has been praying to a hypothetical shared god of the world’s religions.  He conflates “the monotheistic god”—an inadequate catchall that could conceivably have reference to Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, “Brahma”—the Hindu creator god, and a general reference to the gods of other religions.  In this secularized, pluralistic prayer, Cleaver seems to be trying to include everyone—thus effectively excluding most people.

            This notion, that all religions (or at least certain religions) really worship the same god under different names is not at all unique.  It is unsurprising to see it on the religious left, and perhaps the only safe course on the political left.  It is also blasphemous.

            When we read the Scriptures, we do not find God regarding worship of other gods as really being worship of Himself.  We find God profoundly distinguishing Himself from the gods of the pagans, “For all the gods of the peoples are worthless idols, but the LORD made the heavens” (Ps. 96:5, ESV).  God declares the idols worthless (Jer. 10:15), and the worship of such idols futile (Isa. 42:17).  We find not that God may be sought by any name, but that there is one name we must confess, “there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12).

            To whom, then, was Representative Cleaver praying?  Whose “sacred supremacy” does he (and, he presumes, the rest of congress) acknowledge?  Not, apparently, the one true God.

            And that is the real problem behind all the other problems.  If our leaders submitted to the true God, our nation would not advance legislation that defies God and denigrates, devastates, and destroys people made in His image.  Idolatry is the problem, and as long as we worship idols we will harm image-bearers.  All hopes grounded in idolatry are vain.

            But there is a light in the darkness, and hope for any who will have it.  When we acknowledge the one true God, when we confess the name of our Savior, then we find the path of life.  “Because if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved” (Rom. 10:9).  He is the true hope, light, and life eternal.

A-bsurdity

Tags

Christianity, Culture, Culture War, Gender, God, Gospel, Government, Idolatry, LGBTQ+, Religious Left, Secularism, Sexual Revolution, Society

Apparently, Representative Emanuel Cleaver, who holds ordination with the UMC, closed his prayer before congress Sunday, “Amen and awoman,” in what appears to bring an attempt at gender equity.  The problem, of course, is that the word “amen” has no reference, etymologically or in contemporary usage, to the masculine gender.  “Amen” is a Hebrew word meaning “truly,” and is used at the end of prayers as an affirmation, in a tradition built from the word’s biblical usage.  That anyone should make it into a masculine term and construct a corresponding feminine term is, to be charitable, utter silliness.  That a member of congress should do so is a telling commentary on our social situation.

In fact, given the context, we may find Rep. Cleaver’s silliness comparatively innocuous.  The U.S. House of Representatives, under the leadership of Nancy Pelosi, is advancing the dehumanizing ideology of the sexual revolution in ways so farcical that they may obscure the dangers represented.  Madam Speaker (if that continues to be an acceptable reference under her leadership) has an ‘inclusive’ agenda to remove gendered language.  Paulina Enck, writing in The Federalist:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is attempting to excise all references to either sex in House business to “honor all gender identities” and “promote inclusion and diversity.” On Monday, the House of Representatives is set to vote on a Rules Package for the 117th Congress, which Pelosi and Rules Committee Chairman James McGovern promise will be “the most inclusive in history.”

Removing references to men and women?  What does that look like?  Enck elaborates:

This would mean replacing any instance of “he or she” with the grammatically incorrect colloquialism of “they” as a singular, or the unnecessarily long “such Member, Delegate, or Resident Commissioner.” Further, “himself” or “herself” becomes “themself,” a word not recognized by several dictionaries, and acknowledged by the New Oxford Dictionary as “not widely accepted in standard English.”

Words such as “mother” and “father” would be replaced with “parent,” “aunt” and “uncle” with the awkward “parent’s sibling,” and “grandmother” and “grandfather” becomes “grandparent.” I wonder if Pelosi will bring her commitment to language policing to Twitter and remove “mother, grandmother” from her bio.

Next to this agenda, Rep. Cleaver’s bizarre inclusivity appears rather behind-the-times.  “Amen and awoman?” one might ask, “and what about the myriads of other genders we have constructed for ourselves?”  Feminism was an early step in the revolution, and has now been left behind and labeled one of the oppressors; it held onto the notion that there were such things as men and women, real and immutable identities that inhibited our ability to define ourselves.

But, in Pelosi’s effort, we see the inescapable conflict that underlies so much of our social strife.  Rapidly, the pursuit of autonomy turns from defense to offense, and one’s own self-actualization is achieved only by oppressing others.  “Inclusion” is advanced by denying the reality of man and woman; including our self-constructed identities involves neutering all mankind.  Our pursuit of self-defined dignity follows a path that is, quite naturally, dehumanizing.  I say ‘naturally’ because there is a logic at work, which is theological in the end.

Rejecting the Lordship of God—personally and as a society—we seek to remake ourselves in the image of our choosing.  But we are not made in that image.  We are made in the image of God—thus, idolatry leads readily to self-effacement.  The drive to be our own gods fails, and fails spectacularly.  Not only do we fail to become gods, but we disfigure our own humanity.  The whole sexual revolution—pornography, divorce, abortion, promiscuity, homosexuality, transgenderism, and on and on—absurd and devastating as it all is, flows naturally from the rejection of God.

The solution is the gospel.  The antidote to revolution is revival.  Christmas is the offer of dignity, and Easter the hope of renewed humanity.  We cannot ‘identify’ ourselves into anything truly fulfilling; but, if we find our identity in Christ by faith, we will “put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator” (Colossians 3:10, ESV).  Then we will know true inclusion, the joy of true unity, for “Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all” (v.11).

Proclaiming the Light

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Christianity, Cultural Engagement, Culture, Culture War, Education, Pluralism, Relativism, Religion, Religious Left, Secularism, Society, Spirituality, Truth, Universities

            Advent is a season of expectation, and therefore also a season of proclamation: light has come, and all may draw near to the Light of the world, Jesus Christ our Savior and Lord.  This is a message of joy and hope, the gracious gift of God, “good news of great joy that will be for all the people” (Lk. 2:10, ESV).  But, of course, even the joyful message of light meets resistance by a world of darkness; “the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil” (Jn. 3:19).  Our challenge is particularly pointed because we live in a culture than has, in many ways, rejected the light.  That is why our society is so saturated with absurdity, death, and despair.  Rejecting Christ, you will have chaos.

            Consider this opinion article on RNS, written by Simran Jeet Singh, lamenting the closure of religion studies programs at various secular universities.  On one level, it’s not hard to sympathize with his basic contention: learning about world religions ought to be part of higher education.  It is good to understand what other people believe, and why, and how that affects the way they live their lives.  But, while that argument is all well and good, Singh’s opinion also showcases the basic and crippling flaw in secular education—i.e., the fact that it is secular.

            Singh assumes that higher education should “shape our moral and ethical outlooks”, yet he thinks that shaping ought happen precisely through the lens of pluralism, which is a little like saying that giving people a number of perspectives on whether or not it is good to steal is the best way to teach them not to steal.

            His experience with education was one of embracing relativism, framed as humility: “What expanded my mind in college, more than anything else, was coming to terms with the reality that my way wasn’t the only way, or the best way.  Learning about others’ faiths and cultures challenges our self-centered chauvinism and helps us meet others where they are.”  Well, that is a reasonable statement in a secular world, where there is no real spiritual truth; but it fares rather poorly in a world where there is one true God and one true way of salvation, the worldview of Jesus, who said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me” (Jn. 14:16).

            A fundamental relativism lies at the heart of Singh’s concept of religious studies, and I suspect he is right in his evaluation of secular religious studies across the board.  “While many worry about being accused of proselytizing, religion scholars aim to understand historical developments in context. We’re scholars with an interest in religion; not in imposing our views on religion.”  Here is the secular view of proclaiming religious truth: “proselytizing”, “imposing our views on religion”; these derogatory descriptions seem to be, in Singh’s mind, the same thing as when he says “I’m not in it to seek conversions”.

            Such an approach is inconsistent with a world in which there is real spiritual truth.  Imagine if the geology department taught a variety of views, incorporated flat earth studies into the curriculum, and operated with a decided attitude against proselytizing their round earth views!  They don’t, because they’re interested in teaching the truth.  They may respectfully acknowledge that there are people who believe the earth is flat, and even offer some understanding of why they believe that, but, in the end, they want all their students to understand that the world is round.  They want to do this because they have a basic commitment against propagating lies, and because the consequences of believing things that are not true can sometimes be rather significant.

            Our secular universities, at the point at which they became secular, have operated with a basic framework that denies spiritual truth.  The consequences have been severe.  Denying the knowledge of God, we have lost knowledge of mankind; refusing to tell the truth about God, they now tell a variety of lies about humanity.

            But let us come back to Christmas.  The solution is the Light of the world.  God sent His Son so that we may know the truth and be saved.  In a culture that has rejected the light, we proclaim it anew.  A Savior has been born for us, who walked among us and died in our place and rose to bring us life, who Himself declared, “I am the light of the world.  Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (Jn. 8:12).

            The promise remains, the offer of hope, the gift of Christmas—that we may turn to Christ, receive the light, and be saved.