A Vacuum Nature Abhors

So, we’ve all heard the famous maxim about there being a God-shaped hole in all of us that can, of course, only be filled by God. This is similar to the idea that our hearts are restless until they find their rest in God. And, there are many other pithy, witty, and true aphorism and adages like these which truly do express the reality of the human condition: we were mad for communion with God and a lack of divine communion is causally connected to a suboptimal life experience.

Or to put it another way – when you are far from God your life will be far worse than it could be…than it should be. And this is true existentially, as well as intellectually. You see, I used to be a person who made a hard distinction between “wisdom” and “intelligence”. I used to think that you could be really smart and be a fool at the same time. I, like so many others, thought and taught that you can be a person who hates God and also be very smart.

I’m not so sure. Oh, I’ll grant that you can have a high general intelligence. There are a lot of people who are 2 or 3 standard deviations above average intelligence who actively hate God. But, as the old saying goes, “the truth will out”. Or, in Freudian terms, the things we suppress refuse to stay repressed. The problem with God is that he just doesn’t stay dead! Tell yourself “Gott ist tot” all you want, but he just keeps on coming out of the tomb, bright and fairer and more glorious and resplendent than the noonday sun. And, the funny thing is, Freud made a good observation which is that the things you suppress normally find sneaky ways of making their upset known. People who suppress childhood memories of abuse don’t normally just have outbursts of violence against an abusive parent – that would be predictable. But the funny thing about pathology is that it has its own madness to its method.

And, to be sure, to reject God is a pathology. You have to be stupid, insane, or in denial (which I would argue is a form of insanity…and probably stupidity) to believe that everything came from nothing, that life came from non-life, that order comes from chaos, that intelligence comes from unintelligence, that meaning comes from non-meaning, that morality comes from amorality, et cetera. These are fundamentally stupid beliefs and many of them are demonstrably false. For instance, abiogenesis was demonstrated to be false by Louis Pasteur. Fact Check: Pasteur has been dead for a long time. Fact Check: no one has ever shown how life can come from non-life and it ain’t for a lack of trying.

As I said, rejection of God is pathological. And that pathology has some funny ways of working itself out. And by funny I mean “haha” and “well, that’s strange”. And that’s because, as I’ve pointed out before, ideas don’t come as discrete notions that are separable. Ideas come in clusters. The come intertwined and interconnected, as worldviews. Indeed, the biggest ideas, like Theism or Atheism, the come was metanarratives.

Metanarratives, to the uninitiated, are stories that explain all the other stories. They are kinda the glue that holds an entire worldview together. For Christianity, for instance, the metanarrative is that Christ is the image of God in whose image mankind was made and to which image mankind is to aspire and ultimately attain – all things were made to be like Him. However, some desire to reject that image and for all of eternity they will become less and less like Christ while those who desire to receive the image will for all of eternity become more and more like Christ. Of course, there are a lot of ways we could explain what the story behind the stories is. That’s largely a matter of prioritization and perspective. And that’s OK. Because Christians who truly believe in Christ and long for Him coming and their own glorification would probably never say the same thing but they and their statements would all agree – they would all focus on different facets.

But what happens when you reject God – when you reject Theism? Well, you reject the Metanarrative that Christianity offers. And for a while that’s what the young and restless atheists did – they utterly rejected a Metanarrative because they were all enthralled by the French Existentialists and they didn’t want to try to affix meaning and purpose on an absurd reality. Oh how brave and deep!

But the problem is that there’s a Metanarrative-shaped hole inside each of us. And since nature abhors a vacuum, that Metanarrative-shaped hole desires to be filled up. And so, we tried not having metanarratives for a while and that proved…unpleasant. So now, Secularism has joined up with Paganism to give us Wokeism! Secularism couldn’t have a Metanarrative, but Paganism can. Because Paganism is openly religious (Secularism is only surreptitiously so). But in the oddest twist of fate Secularism became a religion, but the metanarrative is a remnant of Marxism which states that everything is about power-dynamics…which also sounds a bit Nietzschean, but hey, who’s counting!

People see young persons shouting about how the least racist country in the world (not not racist, but least racist) is the worst place ever, they see the richest and more pampered populace in world history crying about how they’re poor, they see people who live in a nation which has given more political power to more people for longer than any other place in history and they whine about disenfranchisement! People see this and they think – these people are disconnected with reality.

Well, yes and no. They ARE living in a fantasy world divorced from truth. But it’s not for nothing. It’s a pathology, but not a causeless pathology. Because they’re interpreting the data they see through their Metanarrative. You see, living without a Metanarrative is 1) existentially anguishing 2) intellectually draining 3) morally confounding. When you don’t have a way of interpreting, ordering, and prioritizing facts and data and reality as it is, you’re essentially a human ship lost at sea. Metanarratives are continents upon which to moor and anchor and stop being tossed to and fro by every datum or experience that crosses your path.

Unfortunately, in the globe of worldviews, not all continents are the same. Some are volcanic. Some are peopled with cannibals. Some are mirages. Some are Islands of Darkness and Dreams. Only a few of them are even passably livable – the archipelago called Theism. And only one of them actually is pleasant – Christianity.

The point is this – the suppression of God and its concomitant rejection of Metanarrative cannot happen without pathological consequences. Since people fundamentally as selfish, they’ll seek to alleviate pain and suffering in the least unpleasant way possible. Unfortunately, because people are sinners, and stupid, and essentially self-destructive (another of the ironic mysteries of godlessness that we’re self-pleasing and self-destructive, simultaneously) many are finding acceptance of the racist, classist, narcissistic, white-savior-dominant, epistemologically incoherent metanarrative provided by Wokeism to be preferable to faith in the Living and True God.

The Metanarrative-shaped hole wants filling – nature abhors a vacuum.

I Kant Even

Second verse,

Same as the first –

A little bit louder,

And a whole lot worse!

For those of you who had girlfriends in high school, you may not be aware of a man named Immanuel Kant. He was a German ethical philosopher in the 18th century, best known for two philosophical theories. One: that metaphysical assertions can be proven through logic – what he called a “synthetic a priori” statement. Which is interesting, and it bears impact on what I want to talk about today, but it’s not his most important contribution to the 20th and 21st Centuries. His other big idea was what he called a “categorical imperative”. In short, this idea means that there can be objective moral values and truths without appealing to a transcendent source. Or, in other words, you can have a moral law without a moral lawgiver. Or, in still other words, you can have objective right and wrong without God.

Now, granted, very few people read Kant. He’s a bit boring, and very tedious, and many people – me included – dismiss his arguments out of hand. But a lot of people really like his ideas, even if they don’t like his presentation of his ideas…’cause it’s boring.

Amongst those thoroughly impressed with Kant was a dude named Freddy Schleiermacher. Now, Freddy, he wanted to be the theologian who saved Christianity from its antique mythologies and Bronze Age superstitions. He wasn’t superstitious…he wasn’t even a little “stitious”. So, Freddy and the boys got together and talked about how much they liked Kant’s ideas and then they invented Liberal Christianity (N.B. it only mostly happened like this). And so they got Liberal Christianity off the ground and it was a big hit in Germany. Other things that became big hits in Germany: Beethoven; Science; Hitler…well, 2 out of 3 ain’t bad.

As we should all know by now, the fact that Schleiermacher and his buds were all German speaking white men should tell us they were very bad, rotten, no good, racist scum. But that’s besides the point. The point is that they came up with a theology – a now dominant theology – that attempts to have a Christless Christianity. The Messiah was Messianic because he made manifest the map to mankind’s moral-maturity. Or, to put it another way, Jesus didn’t really die and rise again in fulfillment of the Scriptures to pay for sin and impart new and everlasting life to all who put their faith in Him. No, he lived as a good moral teacher.

Now despite the fact that Lewis completely and elegantly dismantled the “good moral teacher” argument, desperate clingers keep clutching onto it in the vain hope that if they repeat the magic words that “there is no such thing as Divine Judgment”, like the cowardly lion rejecting the reality of spooks, that that will negate the coming Parousia and judgment, when God will judge the world for sin.

So, we can draw a more or less straight line from Kant to Schleiermacher to modern mainline Protestantism and a growing body of “Evangelicalism”. The whole idea is to have a Christ who was nothing more than a moral teacher and thus to have morality without God. And this is important because sinful human beings have a couple of pretty important desires. Let’s consider them:

Not feeling evil.

The ability to justify oneself to oneself.

The ability to not incur the disapproval of others.

Well, actually, let’s not consider them – that can be a project for you to do yourself. Because what I really want to end on is this observation: we’re now in the second worse verse. When Christ was removed from Christianity in Europe, it led to 2 world wars. When morality became definable by human notions of good and bad, we got Stalinism. In the 20th Century we saw what happened when man became the measure of morals, even though society broadly still held to a moral and ethical system based upon the Christian faith, and Christian notions of good and evil. Christianity, even its lingering aura acted as a backstop to halt the most horrendous possible excesses and abuses – which is hard to believe, but all you have to do to see that things could have been worse is to look at the world of East Asia and consider some of the atrocities committed there to begin to grasp how much restraining power Christianity has, even when it’s only a formal and not actual.

As America and the rest of the world becomes truly post-Christian and we’re attempting to define morality, as absolute, imperative, and also defined by us, I shudder to think of the atrocities that will happen in our lifetime. We’re already murdering babies by the millions and selling off their corpses. And I predict it’s going to get worse! And as I try to ponder what the world will be like for my children, I Kant even.  As Jesus warned, “if this is what men do when the tree is green what will they do when it’s dry?”

The Liberal Myth of the Informed Reader

Ars Longa; Vita Brevis.

There is a phenomenon going on among American Christians today. I would like to say that it’s limited to people outside the tent of classical orthodoxy, but it isn’t. It’s the phenomenon of people who insist that you “read” authors with whom you have a major metaphysical disagreement before you can criticize their ideas.

Now, on its face, this seems so utterly and completely reasonable, doesn’t it. Why, who could criticize anyone without giving them a fair hearing? It sounds nuanced and thoughtful. People who use this rejoinder – and I almost exclusively see it being used by Liberals (political and theological…though these almost always go together as a package deal) against Conservatives. Lemme give ya a for-instance.

Luke: Yeah, I simply reject, out-of-hand, that the Scientific Method is inherently racist.

Fool: OMG, have you even READ Ibram X. Kindi?

Luke: No.

Fool: Then how dare you criticize him?! Hater…bigot…

Luke: Because claiming that the Scientific Method is inherently racist is laughable on its face and to deny objective reality is anathema to my metaphysical commitments to…you know…reality.

Fool: You can’t talk about this…you’re too uninformed.

Again, when we take this argument to its conclusion – which is always a good place to test it – then some imbecile could claim that I couldn’t disagree with Satanism if I didn’t read a book by Alistair Crowley. Ummmmmmmmm…no. Sometimes, in fact OFTEN, you CAN and SHOULD judge a book by its cover. Moreover, what these obnoxious pseudo-intellectuals fail to recognize is that there is such a thing as a SUMMARY. Or an ABSTRACT. These handy-dandy little fellas allow you to get a generalized view of someone’s argument so that you don’t have to read the whole thing. Which is convenient for those of us limited by time and space.

For instance. If someone wants to write a 1000-page tome about how people with penises can be women – I’m not going to read it. I’m just not. I don’t need to. You know why I don’t need to? Because people with penises are, BY DEFINITION, not women. In the same way that 2 and 2 don’t make 5, boys aren’t girls, not every minority is a “victim of systemic racism” not all white people are “crypto-racists riddled with white fragility”. These totalizing and absolutist statements are ridiculous on their faces. Ridiculous, from the Latin meaning “laughable”. These are absurd claims that deserve mockery, not serious scholarship and inquiry.

The whole mode of establishing the credentials necessary to enter into an argument by “reading your opponents” thing is a fundamentally bad-faith argument. It’s saying that being able to refute arguments isn’t enough – you have another standard. It’s not enough to simply demonstrate that “systemic racism” is an unfalsifiable metaphysical commitment that parodies the Christian notion of Original Sin, but does so without offering a solution. No. See, that would be what a thinking person would do. A thinking person who had anything worthwhile at all to do wouldn’t waste 5 minutes reading the garbage “literature” that comes from the Race-Hustlers and Woke-Totemists. They wouldn’t waste their time because they have other, more important things to do, and they recognize that reading this “literature” is entirely unnecessary to reject the tenets of the opposition position.

Here’s a fun question: If I can accurately summarize someone’s position and then refute it without committing logical fallacies or misrepresenting my opponent, then…why the hecky-doodles should I waste my time reading their work? But see, people who invoke the “Read it or shut up” mantra don’t think in terms of logic and reason – they think in terms of feelings and for them, browbeating fundy rubes like me by namedropping a bunch of malcontents is the closest they ever come to making a cogent argument.

Because here’s the dirty little secret – they haven’t read the usual suspects either! Gasp! And what’s more, the reason they insist you read the ever lengthening laundry list of the liturgy of the Left, the real reason, the reason they will never admit to you, or to themselves for that matter – it’s because they cannot defend their position. I’m not sure there’s a name for this fallacy, so I’ll coin one, just in case. I call it the Aut Legite! Aut Tace! fallacy: Read or Be Silent!

Actually, there’s already a name for this fallacy, it’s called the Appeal to Authority…it’s a sneakier version of it, and it kinda mixes in with Ad Hominem, but it is a naked appeal to authority.Here’s the deal. If I’ve rejected something…let’s say Critical Race Theory (which I have, publicly, and wrote at length about why) and someone says, Luke, “you’re wrong, because what you’re talking about isn’t Critical Race Theory today – you’re talkin’ about Crenshaw and she’s the past. You need to update your scholarship.” “OK”, I’d say. “Fair enough! Explain to me how the theory has changed. Explain to me the state of the discipline and show how I’m misrepresenting it.” Now if at that point I just get a summer reading list, well, no. I’m not reading it. Summarize the changes for me, and if I think they’re substantial and actually make a meaningful impact on the theory, I’ll definitely give it a looksie. But I’m not just going to read an ocean of material so that I can be up to date on the latest foolishness. I don’t need to be. And this is what a normal human being would expect.

If a Muslim were attacking Christianity and I said, “Hey man, what you’re talking about isn’t really Christianity” and he said, “OK, well how am I wrong?” and all I did was hand him a Bible, do you think he’d take me seriously as a theologian? No. He’d think – and I think we can all admit he’d think quite fairly – that I don’t have the intellectual wherewithal to actually refute his critiques but am just whinging and obfuscating.

When you step into the ring, nobody can contend in your stead – once you enter the lists it’s you and your opponent and you have to stand on your own two feet – or brain cells. You can’t just suckerpunch somebody before the bell and then tag your 800 friends to jump in. That’s not how argument and debate work – you have to actually address your opponent, not just move the goalposts.Because, let’s not pretend that insisting someone read whatever name you happen to drop isn’t moving the goalposts. No. Either debate or don’t. Fight or stay out of the ring.

This is frustrating. And it’s frustrating because it’s an illegitimate attempt to silence opposition, but it’s done in such a snide, arrogant, supercilious way, that it evokes nothing but contempt from me for those who invoke this imperative. It’s not a good-faith way of debating. It’s cowardly. It’s illogical. It’s unreasonable. It ends conversation and debate – it never opens it up. More than that – it means the death of expertise.What this means is that we can never rely on a critic or critique. And for pastors, this is a VERY dangerous game to play! Why? Because God calls us, and churches hire us to be critics for them. They expect us to know what ideas are unchristian and dangerous and they can and do rely on our opinions. And rightly so. It’s kinda utterly ridiculous to say that people shouldn’t: it’s your job you goon!

Oh, trust me, I understand the problems with hero-worship of pastors – but hero worship of pastors and pastors who are authoritarian is a LONG ways from a pastor who studies non-Christian theories so that he can warn his congregation. Sure, we can say that everyone in the congregation should do their own research – we can say it but we know that that’s a stupid and facile argument – theologically it’s like saying that the sheep should learn to fight off the wolves, themselves, otherwise they’ll overdepend on their shepherd. OK. Sure. Go invest some money in livestock and try out your plan: it doesn’t work in oviculture and it doesn’t work in ecclesiology.

You guys…do you not see that what you’re doing is undermining your own profession? – and for most people who engage in this kind of chicanery, I have no doubt that their clerical status is no more than a profession – do you not see that by undermining the ability to summarize complex arguments into forms that can be accepted or refuted based upon already existing objective knowledge or metaphysical commitments is EXACTLY WHAT PASTORS DO EVERY DAY!?

The stupidity is stupendous and stupefying. But here’s the real deal: when someone tries to end an argument by demanding that you read or have read so-and-so, stop treating them like a serious person worthy of being treated like an adult human. Treat them like the petulant child they behave like. Because this is not the kind of argument that a serious person raises. Because serious people understand that ars longa; vita brevis – art is long and life is short. They know that nobody has enough time to read everyone and everything. Being a grown-up means accepting that you can’t know everything about everything, but you CAN choose which worldviews you accept or reject and what components of those worldviews you accept or reject based upon intuition, logic, and coherence with your existing body of knowledge and metaphysical commitments.

The mythical Liberal Reader is a white whale, a unicorn, a chimera – it doesn’t exist. There is no one who could ever read every piece of literature out there – there’s too much. And in the minds of these fools, if you haven’t read everything then you can’t criticize. But doesn’t that sword cut both ways? if you haven’t read everything – can you agree? I would think that not reading everything would be a bigger hindrance to agreement than criticism since making a positive assertion requires more evidence and thoroughgoing knowledge than a negative assertion. Those who advocate CRT and Wokeism and Gender-Bending Child Genital Mutilation, they have to be right ALL THE TIME. I only have to show they’re wrong on one point.Why? Because worldviews are package deals. That’s why they’re called worldviews “weltanschauungen”. The come as a set of precepts, propositions, and metaphysical priors that rise or fall together – they have Gestalt and cohere – even if, like Wokeism in its various iterations they are incoherent!

So, maybe I’m wrong. Maybe I should insist that the Wokeists read every piece of literature imaginable on any topic I wish to try to invalidate their arguments. It’s certainly easier than thinking! So, maybe I do want to commit the aut legite! aut tace! fallacy. Maybe I too wish to enter the hunt for the mythical questing beast known as the Liberal Reader. Perhaps if I find Zim, Ze’ll give me a non-binary set of wishes. Maybe…but I’m not holding my breath.

A Poetic Translation of Psalm 18

A few months ago, I set myself a goal: to not only read but to translate the book of Psalms. Now, considering that I’m not much of a Hebrew scholar, this was a very ambitious goal – but how else will I get better? Moreover, what better way to really understand the genius of the Hebrew tongue but by reading and wrestling with its greatest poetry?! Indeed, years ago when I first started studying Hebrew, my primary reason for doing it was because I wanted to read David’s Psalms as intended!

And while the explosion in growth in the Messianic Jewish community has led to never-before-seen widespread availability to hear the Psalms in a modern musical setting while retaining the beauty and poetry of the Hebrew, the fact remains that very few people are native Hebrew speakers…and very few will ever become Hebrew speakers at all! Which means that for the overwhelming majority of Christians, while groups like MIQEDEM and Joshua Aaron will help us to have a greater appreciation for the pure musical beauty of the Bible, it will do little to increase our appreciation of Hebrew poetry qua Hebrew poetry.

Does this mean that we unfortunate Gentiles should just ignore the poetry and beauty of the Psalms? Of course not! We should take advantage of our brothers and sisters who are putting God’s word to modern music to help us worship! We should challenge ourselves by reading commentaries and listening to sermons on the Psalms. We should actually read them…out loud! In public and in private. The wonderful thing about the Psalms is that they retain a lot of their great qualities even in translation because of how Hebrew poetry works.

But today I want us to look at one Psalm in particular. I want us to consider Psalm 18. I began translating this a few weeks ago and it took me quite a bit of time to translate it and polish the translation to something that both sounds good in English, but also retains some of the qualities of Hebrew. This is a far bigger challenge than I anticipated – and I expected it to be hard. Moreover, the results were disappointing. All I can see is how far short I fell of my goal to give a translation that is both accurate and retains some of the stylistic beauty of the Psalm. I wanted to give you an experience reading it that caused you to lose as little as possible from the Hebrew.

Because that’s all translators really do, is prevent loss. All translations lose something. The best translation is the one that loses the least. And translators have to decide what gets lost! That makes it a very difficult job, because you’re trying to create something and choose its inferiorities! And that’s a tough pill to swallow.

But it’s a tough pill worth swallowing because the work of translation is never done. It can always be improved. And, it’s worth it to try to give people the opportunity to lose a little less of the Word of God – or at least to lose something different and give people something that another translation has lost! That’s the great blessing of being a native English speaker in this day in which we live. We can compare many quality Bible translations and get a composite picture of what the text is in its original language without having to learn the original language.

Since, at Bryan FBC, we’re reading a Psalm a week as our call to worship, I was particularly excited to do this translation in time for us to read it together. Not because I think it’s the best translation out there — it certainly is not — but because I want to give my church a different look at something and maybe, just meybe, help them glimpse just the tiniest bit of the beauty they may not get from another translation.

Because this Psalm truly is beautiful and I highly recommend reading this along with other translations: side-by side. Again, I wrote this translation for you because I wanted to help you experience – even in the smallest way – the joy and beauty and wonder (the transport!) I experienced when working through it in Hebrew. I hope and pray this blesses you in some way!
 

Psalm 18: Poetic Translation

For the Director of Music, by David, the servant of Yahweh – these are the words which he spoke to Yahweh on the day Yahweh delivered him from the hand of all his enemies and the hand of Saul. And He said:

1 I love you, Yahweh, my strength!

2 Yahweh, my Rock and my Fortress and my Deliverer;

         My God, my Stone; I take refuge in You.

         My Shield and the Horn of my Rescue – my Safe Height!

3 Praises I cried, Yahweh;

         And I was rescued from my enemies!

4 Cords of death surrounded me;

         And streams of Belial[1] – they terrified me!

5 Cords of Sheol encompassed me;

         Snares of death confronted me!

6 In my distress, I called “Yahweh!”

         To my God I called for help;

         He heard my voice from His palace;

         And my call for help was before Him and entered His ears!

7 And the earth shook and quaked;

         And the foundations of the mountains trembled;

         And they were shaken because of He was angry.

8 Smoke went up from His nostrils;

         And fire from His mouth consumed;

         Burning coals came from it.

9 He parted the Heavens and came down;

         And thick darkness was under His feet.[2]

10 He made a Cherub his chariot and flew;

         And He glided on the wings of the wind.

11 He made darkness His hideaway;

         Holing himself up in a hut:[3]

         Waters of darkness – clouds of thunderheads.

12 Gleaming in front of Him, the clouds crossed –

         Hail and fiery coals.

13 He thunders in the heavens, Yahweh Elion,

         He shouts –

         Hail and fiery coals.[4]

14 He sent arrows of lightning,

         And He scattered them;

         Much lightning – and they were panicked.

15 The streams of water were seen;[5]

         And the foundations of the mainland laid bare,

         By your rebuke, Yahweh,

         By a breath of wind from your nostrils.[6]

16 He sent from the High Place and He took me;

         He drew me out of the great waters.

17 He delivered me from my strong enemy;

         And from my haters that are too strong for me.

18 They confronted me[7] in the day of my distress;

         And Yahweh was my help.

19 He brought me out into open places;

         He pulled me out because He takes pleasure in me.

20 Yahweh repaid me according to my righteousness;

         According to the purity of my hands He rewarded me.

21 Because I had heard of Yahweh’s ways,

         And I did not become evil before my God.

22 Because all His judgments are in front[8] of me,

         And I have not turned from His statutes.

23 And I was complete[9] with Him;

         And I was wary of perversion.

24 And Yahweh repaid me according to my righteousness;

         According to the cleanness of my hands in his perception.[10]

25 With the lovingkind you are lovingkind;

         With integrous men you are integrous!

26 With the purified you are pure;

         To the crooked you’re a crook.

27 Because You, you rescued the humble;

         And you humiliate the haughty.

28 Because You, Yahweh, you light my lamp,

         My God makes light shine in darkness.

29 Because by you I can rush into an army of marauders;

         By my God I can leap a wall!

30 The God is integrous in His way;

         Yahweh’s words are refined;

         A shield to all who seek refuge in Him.

31 Because, who is a God besides Yahweh?

         And who is a Rock apart from our God?

32 The God girds me with power;

         He gives my way integrity.

33 He makes my foot like a deer’s;

         And He causes me to stand in the high places.

34 He makes my hands wise for war,

         And my arms can bend a brazen bow.

35 You gave me the shield of your salvation!

         And your right hand upholds me;

         And by making yourself little you make me large![11]

36 You make room under me[12] for my steps;

         And my ankles do not slip.

37 I pursue my enemies and overtake them;

         I do not return until they are destroyed.

38 I break them to pieces and they cannot arise;

         And they fall under[13] my feet.

39 You clothe me in brawn for battle;[14]

         You cause those who arise against me to kneel under me![15]

40 You make my enemies give me their necks;[16]

         And I exterminate my haters.

41 They cried for help[17] and there was no helper;

         To Yahweh and He did not answer them!

42 I crush them like dust in the wind;

         I dump them out like mud in the streets.[18]

43 You brought me out of a dispute with a people;

         You set me as the head of a nation;

         A people I did not know serve me.

44 They hear a report about me;

         Sons of a foreigner fawn over me.

45 Sons of a foreigner lose heart;

         They come cringing out of their strongholds.

46 Yahweh lives! And blessed be my Rock!

         Exalted be the God who saves me!

47 The God is the giver of my vengeance;

         He speaks and subdues peoples under me.

48 The One who frees me from my enemies;

         You lift me up over those who arise against me;

         You deliver me from violent men.

49 Therefore I will praise you among the nations, Yahweh;

         And I will sing your name!

50 The One who makes His king’s salvation great,

         And He makes lovingkindness for His anointed –

         To David and his seed forever!

Explanatory and Translation Notes:

[1] Belial means “useless” or “uselessness”; some consider this a term for Hell. Hanna in 1 Samuel asks that Eli not think of her as a “daughter of Belial”. It’s not a common word, but it is a difficult one to translate. Compare how other translations treat this word.

[2] Notice the emphasis of things being places “under” and “under my feet”. This is a major theme in this Psalm.

[3] The literal word for “holing-up” is SBB. It’s seems to be a reference to  verse 5 – where the cords of the grave “encompass” David. I chose to use this alliterative format to follow the beautiful Hebrew alliteration:

“Yasheth choshekh s’veevowthayv sookathow chashkhath-mayeem ahvee shachakeem”.

[4] Some manuscripts do not have this repetition of “hail and fiery coals”.

[5] This probably refers to deep undersea currents or the subterranean rivers which seem prominent in ancient thought.

[6] Nostrils are significant as the word for nose/ nostril is also the word of anger.

[7] See verse 5 where the same verb “confronted” is used to the snares of death.

[8] This is a different word than the word I translate as “before me”. David is trying to give some nuance here that is complex.

[9] A difficult word to translate. When referring to sacrifices of animals and other things, it means without blemish. This is its most common use. It also refers to God as being perfect. It is also used to mean “all”, as in “all of something” – see Lev. 3:9, 23:15, 25:30; Joshua 10:13. When referring to people it means something like complete, having integrity, being blameless, being perfect in ethical character. It refers to Noah. It might refer to the Devil, pre-fall – see Ezekiel 28:15. It’s a fairly common word, used 91 times in the OT. It’s also one of the most common words in this Psalm. God, Yahweh, and Enemy are the only nouns (or verbs) used more in this Psalm. Thus, it is crucially important. See also, II Samuel 22.

[10] Here there is a resumption of the “according to” seen in verse 20. There is a clever pun David plays on the last words of verses 23 and 24. The last word in 23 is “guilt/ transgression/ sin” “ah-ownee” the last word in 24 is “in his eyes” “ay-nee-ow”. Unfortunately there is not a good way to convey the poetry in English and retain the genius of the Hebrew.

[11] There is actually no alliteration in Hebrew here, but there is a clear poetry or parallelism that English doesn’t convey well, so I used alliteration to try to convey it.

[12] Another reference to “under”.

[13] See above.

[14] Literally, “You gird me in strength for battle.”

[15] Under, again!

[16] This idiom seems to mean “run away” or “retreat”, but the imagery is too good to gloss over in this type of translation.

[17] Note the resumption of this verb from verse 6.

[18] See note from Expositor’s Bible Commentary:
“The enemies’ strength was reduced so that they were no more than useless “dust” (cf. 2 Ki 13:7), only good for being stepped on, like “mud” (cf. Isa 10:6; Mic 7:10) in the open places (“streets,” v. 42). It may well be that the battles are those mentioned in 2 Samuel 8:10, but the more general point of the section lies in the confidence that no enemy can stand up against the Lord’s anointed.”

Get On With It! Or, How Homiletics Can Be Improved by Eliminating Unillustrative Introductions

It happened again. I watched a sermon by a friend. And it wasn’t bad, really. It didn’t have any overt heresy and the message seemed ok, if not exceptionally well delivered. But the congregation was very into it and I think he communicated his message.

Except I’m not sure that he did. Because when I watched it, I watched the first 3 minutes and tuned out. I did this several times. Several times I watched the beginning and tuned out and had to restart it. Why? Because it took 6 minutes to actually get to the point. 6 minutes. The first 6 minutes. That means that out of a 34 minute sermon 1/6th was devoted to an introduction that really didn’t add anything to the sermon.

That’s a problem.

That’s a tragedy.

But it’s not an uncommon tragedy. In fact, there is a crisis in American preaching – a crisis of crappy introductions that rob messages of their power and rob parishioners of their attention span. Because let’s not pretend that people don’t check out of a message they find boring. I’m a pastor. And I’ve been preaching sermons and messages for over a decade. I like preaching. I love listening to preaching. And if I can’t pay attention, then what chance does someone who really isn’t into rhetoric gonna do?

I mean, it’s possible that because I listen to so many great rhetors that I’m spoiled and have no patience for anyone who isn’t great. Maybe. But I tend to think that I have a pretty good attention span, and quite a bit of patience with people who are trying their best. But I think the proof that it’s not just me is the pressure to shorten sermons. It’s not ALL because of people’s short attention spans due to conditioning through television. It’s also because a lot of preaching is bad and boring. And one of the worst things a preacher can do is get off on a bad foot by having a boring beginning.

Now, let me pause for a sec and say that, yes, a good introductory illustration is exceedingly powerful – if its poignant and well delivered. But the fact of the matter is that very few speakers are really good speakers and to use a good illustrative intro you need to be a good speaker. And so there’s a dilemma. Preachers who may well be godly men who love their flocks and love God and love the word are struggling to give people a message that will help them follow Jesus, but they just aren’t great at preaching. So, they try to use illustrations and long introductions to spice things up. But that just makes it worse.

You seed, mediocre public speaking that gets to the point is infinitely better than mediocre public speaking that hims and haws and spends the time when the audience is most attentive dithering and not saying anything of consequence. Or, to put it another way, saying something poorly is a lot better than saying nothing poorly. And I think that that is actually fairly obvious. So why do people keep doing it? Well, I have a couple reasons why pastors and preachers feel shackled to the introduction. I’d like to list these problematic reasons and then offer solutions.

The Problemos:

1)     Too much topical preaching. You see, topical preaching, when done well, is really good. Some of the greatest preachers of all time – some of my heroes – are topical preachers. But preaching topically, week after week, year after year, requires a couple things. A) a LOT of talent. B) an immense knowledge of the Scriptures and theology to make sure that people are getting the whole counsel of God (though I have my doubts whether this is even possible) C) and immense amount of discipline to not just preach your personal preference. Very few people have this cluster of skills and personality traits. But because this is what the best (read: most popular) preachers do, then this must be the best method. However, oftentimes, what works for geniuses doesn’t work for journeymen. And this is particularly true in the performing arts (of which preaching is certainly part). Geniuses often eschew formal methodologies and get away with it – because their natural talent overtops the skills that conventional instruction inculcates.[1] But we’re not all geniuses. Those of use who are just your run-of-the-mill, lunchpail preachers can’t get by on raw talent and rhetorical prowess. We can’t do things their way any more than a beginner chess player can’t try sacking his queen every game like Mikhail Tal – I mean, he CAN, but he’ll remain a very weak player!

2)     We need the courage of our convictions. Too many times men walk into the pulpit (although pulpits are a bit passé, ey) and while they believe in what they’re saying they know that some people will reject their message and so they try to make the gospel palatable or relatable. The first words of their message are, essentially, an apology for preaching! Don’t apologize for preaching…ever. If you’re giving out the Word of God as it is to people as they are then you’re doing the Lord’s work and don’t ever apologize for that!

3)     We need the convictions of our courage! Too pastors they don’t really believe that what they’re saying is NECESSARY for the spiritual growth of the people who are about to hear what they say. And, often, it’s because it isn’t. Too many men are coming up and boldly asserting their opinions instead of the Word of God. And that’s a fast road to nowhere.

Some Solutions (respectively):

1)     Preach Lectio Continua. Start in Genesis and work your way through the Bible. Preach entire books and genres. Preach through the Bible and then several things will happen. A) You won’t need to introduce completely novel material every week. You and your congregation will know what’s next by – you know, literally looking at the next pericope! B) You’ll have the advantage of your audience being familiar with the context and so you won’t have to introduce more than what is absolutely necessary. C) Illustrations that ARE used will apply directly to a text that fits into a context that’s familiar and will, therefore be more natural and easier to understand.

2)     Believe in the Word of God. If we actually believed that the Scriptures are Divinely Inspired and are Living and Active and Sharper than any Two-Edged Sword – literally God Breathed – then why do we need some little illustration. Just get into the Bible. It’s God’s Word that matters, not my take on it! Quit apologizing for the Bible and just preach it. You have to actually take off before you can land the airplane. And too many fail to land because they’ve failed to launch!

Addressing Critiques:

So, it’s possible that someone would say, “Well, Lukey, even presuming you’re right why shouldn’t we emulate the best and try to become like them? Aren’t you setting preachers up for long term mediocrity?” The problem is that there’s a difference between emulating someone and trying to be someone. Look, I played Rugby in college. I liked it. And I wasn’t terrible. I could practice like great ruggers and I could do some of the things they did – but if I got on the field against the All Blacks or England or South Africa, I’d get hurt. Being able to do what someone else does doesn’t mean you can do what they do. I can play chess – so does Magnus Carlson – but I could play Magnus a million times and literally probably never win a game. So, telling pastors who lack the rhetorical skill to do what a great genius does is not the soft bigotry of low-expectations, but not setting people up for failure.

We all have limits. Some people’s limits mean they can’t dunk a basketball – some people’s limits mean that they can’t speak extempore before a live audience and thrill them and chill them and get them to follow you. That’s OK. You can be a good preacher without being a great one! And the world needs a lot of good preachers.

Some might say, “But Luke, this is how people are taught to preach”. I know. That’s why we need a cadre of young seminarians marching with placards at the seats of Spiritual Academia chanting, “Hey-Hey! Ho-Ho! Sermon intros gotta go! [Repeat ad nauseam]. Is doesn’t mean ought. If it isn’t effective either fix it or dump it.

Some might say, “But Luke, good sermon intros are really useful”. Sure, they are – so is dunking the basketball from the foul line. But I can’t do it. So is being able to remember 1,000s of chess games move by move, with variations, and the names of the players, and the year, and the location of the tournament. But I can’t do either of those things because I’m neither a world class baller or chesser. If you can’t do something well enough for it to not be a hindrance, then don’t do it! You don’t need it.

Sermon Intros are unnecessary; they augment the text. But they aren’t the text and we can get along just fine without them. If you don’t need it and all it’s doing is dragging you down, then cut bait and move on.

In Conclusion:

Unfortunately, I have to say to many of my co-laborers, “you’re doin’ it wrong”. Just get in the pulpit and give the Word of God. Stop trying to be Piper of MacArthur or McGee. Just be yourself and give out the Word. We can have confidence that God will use it. We don’t need to improve it. We just need to get it out and let it do its work. As a great preacher once said: you don’t’ put a tiger in a cage to protect the tiger! It can take care of itself. Don’t try to take care of the Bible – it’ll take car of itself: we just need to let it out of its cage!

A Footnote:

[1] In the brilliant book Land of the Firebird, Suzanna Massie describes how some Russian art critics thought that the native genius of the Russian soul meant that formal European Conservatory education was unnecessary because it could never produce the greats – the greats had to be born. But, as is pointed out in the book – not every composer NEEDS to be a generational genius – it’s good to have conservatories so that a nation can have a host of competent musicians and directors. There’s significant overlap here. Also, someone stole my copy of Land of the Firebird years ago and that makes me sad.

I’m Not Cynical; You’re Cynical!

Now, if you’re a person with a memory that goes all the way back to…I don’t know, several months ago when the who “pandemic” thing started; you’d remember that people…forward thinking people…handsome people…people like…me…we were saying that the costs of the lockdown might outweigh the benefits they provide. People like me said this in public and in private. People like me said that while Coronavirus is real, and is deadly serious if you’re in a high-risk category (read: old), that it isn’t actually a very big threat to people who are – let’s pick a random, non-specific example – school-age children. In fact, for school-age children, this is not really a thing.

But instead of crafting thoughtful policies that would allow several things to happen simultaneously, things like: protecting the most vulnerable; recognizing the constitutional right to LIBERTY; weighing the costs in despair through violence done to the economy and human society – instead of doing that, it was decided that just a blanket shut down, and onerous and completely ineffective measures would be foisted upon the public simply to make it seem as though government were doing something. OK, I admit that that’s only ONE take on the lockdown mandates. Here’s another one: power-hungry bureaucrats who get their jollies enforcing their will on others saw this as an opportune time to do some good old fashioned bullying. Or, here’s another one: people who wanted to expand the power and scope of government (read: Cryptocommunists…aka Statists) used this as A) an opportunity to expand governmental authority and or B) a stress-test on people’s will to be free. Or, here’s another one: people in government in good faith thought that what they were doing was the best thing they could think to do…and they just aren’t very smart/ brave/ forward-thinking.

And while all of these may be true to some extent. There is another option that seems to be quite likely and the evidence is coming in that it may, for some, be the likeliest of all. Because suddenly we’re seeing reports from the mainstream media about the NEGATIVE consequences of lockdowns. Now, admittedly, I don’t follow major network news for a variety of reasons, chief among which being that I have a functioning prefrontal cortex. But that’s neither here nor there. The point is that all the sudden, the major networks seem to want to talk about the costs of shutdown. In November. After their candidate Joe Biden has ostensibly won the election.

That’s weird. I mean, weren’t the consequences of lockdown apparent in…I dunno…October? Or…September…or and month preceding those months…or November before we had the vast majority of election returns? It’s just such a weird coincidence that, suddenly, for no reason at all! that people are noticing that shutting down the economy, isolating the elderly to isolation and despair, forfeiting the education of young people, and revoking people’s constitutional rights actually might have negative consequences. I mean, there’s no way that the delay in reporting could be politically motivated…no way…Democracy Dies in Darkness. Journalists are the most heroic and unbiased among us. Just ask ‘em; they’ll tell ya!

But, and forgive me for even asking such a slanderous, and far-fetched, fantastical, question, but, could it be that the 4th Estate hasn’t said anything because they wanted to use the ‘Rona against Trump as a cudgel, and now that they’re confident that Biden has secured the election, it’s time to let the good times roll?! I mean what could make Biden more popular than being the guy who oversaw the end to lockdown and the revitalization of the economy?!

But that’s impossible. Because the media are unbiased arbiters of truth with no agenda but an agenda to fairly and accurately report the facts as presented to people who need them to come to informed decisions in their lives. To suggest otherwise would mean that an entire sector of our society is corrupt and actively conspiring to suppress the truth in unrighteousness for the sake of their own political preferences. Which would mean that to the extent that they influence policy, the media are responsible for the drug overdoses, the alcoholism, the suicides, the elder abuse, the elder despair, the joblessness, the under and unemployment, the divorces, and the widespread growing ignorance of schoolboys and girls.

But that’s a scary thought, so let’s just go back to assuming that all the triliteral networks and their adjuncts really are just fair dealers. To assume otherwise would mean that the media are cynical demagogues who only care about power and how to wield it and who don’t care at all about human flourishing. What a cynical view. I mean…it’s my view. But what do I know.

The Kids Aren't Alright

OK, so we all know what holiday we’re going to celebrate, and I hope we all, will, indeed, celebrate it, because it deserves celebration. We need, crucially need days of Thanksgiving, particularly as we, culturally, become more and more pagan. I don’t say secular – because secular implies value-neutral, which has always been a myth but it was a myth with an aura of credibility. But we’re not moving into hyper secularity, rather our culture is moving into out-and-out paganism.

And several pieces of news pointed out how we’re becoming an incoherent and pagan society and how this points us to our need for Thanksgiving that’s robust and meaningful. What I mean to say is that Thanksgivings that are all saccharine sweetness, and a trite counting of blessings without actually taking stock of life as it stands is nothing more than psycho-spiritual denial. A faith that can’t reckon with what’s wrong isn’t a faith worth having.

What do I mean by this?

What I mean is that Thanksgiving in America has become another day of living in denial of the realities that confront our churches, our culture, and our society. We live in political chaos; our churches are dwindling; our culture is burning itself down – as are our cities; we have people screaming that everything is racist; we have people forcing little boys to say that they’re little girls and we have people who have taken the Hippocratic Oath to do no harm who are mutilating the genitals of these children as a sacrament to their pagan gods of death and destruction; young people are riddle with despair; the elderly are riddled with despair; and the middle-aged in the middle are living in the constant existential anxiety that their lives are meaningless and that they have no real value and so narcotize this stress with consumer goods, television, gluttony, alcoholism, narcotics, and porn. We’re a nation that can only be described in the immortal words of Yeats:

Turning and turning in the widening gyre  

The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere  

The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

The best lack all conviction, while the worst  

Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;

Surely the Second Coming is at hand.  

The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out  

When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi

Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert  

A shape with lion body and the head of a man,  

A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,  

Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it  

Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.  

The darkness drops again; but now I know  

That twenty centuries of stony sleep

Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,  

And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,  

Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

Indeed, the center cannot hold. What is happening cannot continue to happen without some critical change, because we all have the feeling that it can’t keep on like this. In the far less poetic words of Frank Sinatra: Something’s gotta give.

But I ask my Christian brothers and sisters, when we come and worship in our churches – do we cry out to God and beg Him to change our culture and society by bringing power and vindication to the Saints and confounding and cursing the work of the hands of the Godless? Do we sing hymns and psalms of lament, confessing our sin and crying out to God to deliver us from evil? Or is it all “the fourth, the fifth The minor fall, the major lift”? Are the songs we sing honest? Does the music of our churches actually, worshipfully express our heart to God, or is it just a bunch of repeating hopeful notes and confidently asserting things that deep down we wonder about?

You see, brothers and sisters, the Evangelical church has decided that Laments are out of step with the needs of seekers and that, frankly, they’re depressing, and we don’t want to do them any more. Almost a decade ago, Michael Gungor had this to say:

Approximately 70 percent of the Psalms are laments. Approximately 0 percent of the top 150 CCLI songs (songs sung most in churches) are laments.

Now let’s think about this for a second. Because that is both true and disturbing. If the Psalm breakdown is 70/30 in favor of Laments; and there’s a whole book of the Bible called Lamentations, and many of the prophets included Laments, and Paul commands us to weep with those who weep, then shouldn’t we sometimes, perhaps, maybe sing some Laments as part of our worship?

Look, I believe in the Atonement as much as the next handsome genius, but does that mean that we cannot, that we ought not EVER lament over our own sin. Does the cross mean that we never should engage in a day of humiliation and confession and reckoning with our own sin? Because some of history’s greatest saints have said, “yes…yes we should”. People like Jonathan Edwards, who most certainly believed in full atonement through Christ and was not a works-righteousness dude, said it was important for them to think on their sin and their mortality and to do so OFTEN!

But, I know, I know, thinking on our sin is puritanical and not what good little Evangelicals are supposed to do. It’s not “affirming”. I know that we don’t sing laments and we don’t have public confession and days of humiliation because that isn’t what lifts people-up. I know that there’s this general belief that if Church ever makes you sad that it’s failed in its mission to deliver the good life to the people who attend.

And I know that that’s utter and complete trash. The idea that churches are supposed to make people happy and uplifted has turned churches into nothing more nor less than Spiritual drug dealers. We’re not dealing with the Spiritual and Emotional and Practical crises that people face – we’re just trying to force them to put on a happy face and grin through their grimace and suffer with a smile. There’s a word for this mentality – it’s abuse. Forcing people to live out an emotional experience that is untrue is abusive. Now, certainly, a person’s emotions can be wrong. Sometimes a person can be angry when they have no right to be. But saying that occasionally people experience emotions that are not rooted in reality is very different than saying that it’s wrong to ever be mad or sad or anything but glad!

I find it fascinating that so many people complain that churches are full of hypocrites – and so many in church leadership bloviate about the needs for authenticity, when simultaneously every element of worship is designed to make people behave inauthentically. We complain about the “masks” and the need to feel like, as women are wont to say, “we’ve got it all put together” and yet nobody seems to notice that spending the majority  of any church service singing about how happy you are might actually be contributing to the mixed messaging?

And speaking of mixed messaging – what about the cognitive dissonance when a pastor spends his whole sermon (which Heaven forbid takes longer than 20 minutes – because God knows that there’s no possible way anyone who truly loves Christ with all their heart, soul, mind and strength would need anything longer that an episode of the office of Netflix once a week to be rightly instructed and discipled in the faith) – what about that cognitive dissonance when a pastor spends his whole sermon trying to get people to think deeply on the condition of their souls and that gets followed up by a rousing rendition of some happy-clappy, pop song designed to not make you think critically or deeply about anything and to merely be swept away by the emotional tone imposed upon you by the chords and the often vapid lyrics? What about that?

Now, look, I’m not against happy music, per se. Happy music is good. Praise is good. But praise is not limited to happy songs. Praises can be and are laments. Worship is lament – and biblically speaking, the OVERWHELMING MAJORITY of musical worship is Lament. Sad songs are good. Sad songs are necessary. And ignoring the sad songs only reinforces the hypocrisy of contemporary Evangelicalism.

I know all the hep cats are talkin’ about how they’re “hot messes” on their twitterboxes and book-faces, but do they actually lament their failings? Or are they using their emotionally uninvested confession of being a “hot mess” as a stalking horse for not coming to terms with the deeper realities of their spiritual conditions which may very well be that they are shallow, vapid, unserious people who are squandering their lives in the vain attempt to serve two or more masters? Because when I look at contemporary Evangelicalism I see, frankly, a LOT of public figures who are saying nothing but shallow, vapid, unserious motivational pabulum which, if taken as gospel advice, will lead their acolytes to live shallow, vapid, unserious and squandered lives. And the fact of the matter is that all of us to some extent or another ARE shallow, vapid, unserious human beings who squander the gifts God has given us and that is a tragedy. And it’s a tragedy that ought to be lamented!

But whither away shall we confront our condition? Where can we go to come to terms with the fact that we do fail to live up to the high calling of God in Christ Jesus? Church, the place where we are to regularly be discipled and disciple our brothers and sisters, is really, not a safe-space anymore. You cannot be honest at church anymore, because the entire format of “church” is designed to prevent you from acknowledging your own Spiritual and Existential despair.

But we have a diagnostic problem in Christianity today. We have a problem which as long as it persists will prevent us from moving forwards. You see, the whole logic behind all the happiness – the logic behind not having public sharing of struggles and prayer concerns, the logic behind not having public confession of sin, the logic behind never preaching about sin or advocating repentance and public humiliation, the logic behind never singing a sad song or lament is that people don’t want it. But I think people DO want it. I think people want it because sadness and lamentation affirm the humanness of people who are sad and lament. Constantly trying to shove a smile down someone’s throat doesn’t affirm their lived experience – it denies the authenticity of their life, it forces them into hypocrisy, and frankly, lotsa people hate that. It’s bad anthropology, it’s bad ecclesiology, it’s bad Christianity. But see, nobody wants to reckon with that reality. We keep thinking that the problem is the cure. We keep doubling down on the happy and pushing the sad further and further out of orbit. And it’s making church and Christianity increasingly irrelevant.

But I want to be completely clear – sadness is ok. And more than that; sadness is good. It’s good to feel sad. It’s good to feel sad about a lot of things. It’s good to feel sad about sin. It’s good to feel sad about sickness and death. It’s good to feel sad about injustice. It’s good to feel sad about poverty. It’s good to feel sad about people’s marriages breaking up, and kids becoming estranged, and people being persecuted and hated at work and by their families. This world is a sad place and it’s ok to feel sad.

Indeed, it’s a sin to not feel sad. Jesus says, “blessed are those who mourn”! Again, Paul commands us to weep! James commands sinners to weep and wail. Expressions of sadness, particularly public expressions of sadness are not only good, but commanded by God.

One of the reasons I became a Christian was because the Bible was the only thing I’d ever read that actually dealt with human nature as it really is. I became a Christian because Christ and Christianity actually deal with the human condition in a meaningful way that will actually solve our problems. But for some reason the church is running from this. We’re running from our greatest asset.

But the world isn’t! The wildly popular show: The Good Place has a scene where a character explains that being human means always being a little bit sad because of our recognition of our own mortality. And I think that’s true, so far as it goes. There’re more reasons that we’re always a little bit sad, but that’s certainly part of it. My point is not that The Good Place is full of good theology – largely it isn’t. But my point is that the non-Christian, and even the antichristian world are being more honest about the nature of human nature than we are – and their art and culture is at least trying to honor humanity as it is and reckon with our problems – but Christianity isn’t.

There’s a word for the condition that American Evangelicalism has fallen into. The word is “decadence”. And history has shown us what happens to decadent churches.

In fact, let me give you one of the earliest examples of a decadent church:

“To the angel of the church in Laodicea write:

These are the words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the ruler of God’s creation. I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth. You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see.

Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest and repent. Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.

To the one who is victorious, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne, just as I was victorious and sat down with my Father on his throne. Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches.”

I’m all for praising God for the good things he’s done. Thanksgiving is good. But a Thanksgiving where we don’t lament what needs lamentation isn’t really a thanksgiving; it’s triumphalism. It’s decadent. It needs to stop.

The world knows this. The world knows how to lament. The title of this essay is The Kids Aren’t Alright; it’s a reference to a song title by The Offspring. It’s very worth watching the video and reading the lyrics. But the most poignant line in the whole song is the end of the bridge:

What the hell is going on
The cruelest dream, reality

The Offspring are writing and singing from a perspective that’s being as honest as it can. They aren’t Christians so they can’t point to the solution to the problems of society, but they certainly can address them and lament them! And the church used to know this. Christian artists used to know that. And Christian pastors used to know that. We need to relearn the old lesson of lamentation.

We used to know that just drowning our sadness and our sorrow and the pain that we live in, in a bunch of happy-clappy songs and a bunch of false joy is not spiritual — it’s pathological. We used to know this. I don’t know we know that anymore. I don’t think we know how to lament, because I don’t think we know how to be authentically human. But we need to learn how to lament; we need to learn how to be authentically human — because until we can do that we can’t really become like Christ.

To Have and to Hold

How lonely do you have to be to hold hands with a robotic hand? How lonely do you have to be to buy a robotic hand to hold? Survey says: pretty, incredibly lonely. Of all the sad things I’ve seen in the world, one of the saddest most certainly must be the new Osampo Kanojo “walk girlfriend” robot hands that were invented in Japan. Apparently there are a lot of lonely men in Japan who want to hold hands and go for a walk. Enter: Science. Science decided that what these sad and lonely Japanese men needed wasn’t to make changes in their lives to make them boyfriend material. Nope. What they needed was a robot-hand that is warm and perspires.

This is next level pathetic.

Now, don’t get me wrong; I’m not trying to shame these men. I don’t need to. Simply purchasing and utilizing a robot hand as a simulacrum for female companionship comes with its own special sense of shame that, even if I wanted to, I couldn’t add on to. Some crimes are their own punishment. Some sins come ready-made with the pain that sin causes. It’s the nature of folly – it is inherently self-destructive. And this…phenomenon…obviously brings a hefty helping of hopelessness along with it.

I can think of few things more emasculating than buying a robot hand to hold – it’s at once innocent and depraved, which makes its depravity all the more depraved. Japanese scientists have found a way to make hand-holding creepy.

Forgive me for a second, but there is something to be said about this and why I think this might actually be worse than pornography (at least in some ways). Pornography is objectification and fantasy. So is this. Pornography, even the stuff that doesn’t actively involve physical violence against women, is not supposed to be meaningful. Porn doesn’t represent meaningful passionate sexual intercourse (at least not that I’m aware of). Porn represents tawdry, depraved, acts of sin, that are wrong and that are known to be wrong. There is the inherent sense of conquest. Pornographic sex is, fundamentally, adversarial. Or at best mutually parasitic. Both people are using eachother to get something. It’s vulgar and low and tries to erase meaning from sex – which is horrifying, but at least its honest in its animal promiscuity.

But fake hands to hold replace partnership. Hand-holding is one of the most powerful forms of physical intimacy because it symbolizes mutual trust, common goals, a willingness to go together! You can’t go farther ahead or fall farther behind than arm’s length and hold hands. When my wife and I hold hands on a walk we’re agreeing to go together to the same place at the same pace. Holding hands, in many ways, is more intimate than kissing or even sex. Sex can be perfunctory. It can be animal. Hand holding rarely is. There’s something even more vulnerable about hand-holding, perhaps because it is non-coital. Perhaps because it’s pure partnership. It’s not two people looking into eachother; but two people looking out at the world – but together.

And Japan just ruined it. Japanese scientists saw this empty gaping hole in the lives of lonely Japanese men and decided that the best way to ease the existential anxiety of living alone was to give them a robot hand…seriously. I mean, first of all, and not to be crass, but if you think these things are only being used for hand-holding, then…well, you can have your delusions. Secondly, how is this fixing anything?! This is only making things worse – and moreover, it simply furthers the objectification of women.

We’re finding ways to make the partnership of marriage or a committed relationship into a commodity. Wives and girlfriends aren’t sought because people want a companion, but because they want the emotional benefits of companionship. They don’t want to put in the work of becoming someone worth dating or marrying, or to change their lifestyle to have time for a relationship, or to put in the effort to meet the right person, or lower their standards to a realistic level, or get in shape, or improve their hygiene, or get a better job, or develop courage, or to grow and develop morality and character, or just plain grow-up. Cause that’s hard work. No, the solution isn’t becoming someone worth dating – it’s getting a robot-hand and holding it on walks.

I’m not sure that I could come up with a more apt image of the self-loathing narcissism that our age is embroiled in than a young professional taking a walk with a petite, slightly sweaty, body temperature, robot hand. And of course in the minds of our secular, and moronic age, people have decided that this is the kind of things we can’t judge people about. One writer even allowed this vacuous thought to escape their brain and pollute the souls of others:

“Sure we could sit here only in the judgment of this hand. It’s weird, yes. Really weird. But who are we to judge these people. They’re lonely. It’s a different culture. And, unless some Skynet stuff goes down and the hands start strangling their owners, these robot hands aren’t hurting anyone either. They’re harmless albeit kind of weird inventions from a country that routinely invents kind of weird stuff for better (Pokemon! Anime!) and worse (used panty vending machines).”

Except they are hurting people. They’re hurting the people who buy and use them to narcotize the crisis of their souls. It’s not only not helping them grow as people, but it is actively reinforcing the thought that wives and girlfriends, and by extension women in general, only exist as a means of satisfying a man’s emotional and physical appetites. It’s gross.

This is simply more evidence of why the Church needs to focus on anthropology and actually demonstrate how Christ and His Wisdom offers answers to the problems we face as societies and as individuals. But mark my words – wherever Christ is absent, so will be real human love. Sex robots are already here, and soon and very soon they will replace actual women as companions. When Lars’ Real Girl gets Alexa in her circuit boards, actual woman will be the Happy Hunting Ground of Alpha males only. We’re going to see more polyamory and I think bigamy and trigamy and all the “gamies” once the technology is there for Betas and Gammas to have a maid/ mommy/ mistress that has the body of a ten and whose demands and needs can be satisfied with a USB port. Men too weak or cowardly to become actual men will live their pornographic fantasies with their sexbots; spilling their seed in a dishwasher safe robot recepticle; giving their best strength to circuitry and their years to a computer. These men will finally get what they always wanted – a beautiful “woman” who adores them and cares only for their needs and makes no demands but only wishes to be a doting, ever-ready slave. A woman who wants a real man is gonna have to choose between the classic-jerk (whose species will rapidly be expanding) and the man of character (who will soon be on the endangered species list).

I could talk on this issue for a long time. But I don’t want to, because it’s simply too depressing. Long story short: robot girlfriends are always a bad idea. Robot girlfriends hurt men, hurt women, and hurt society. Also…it’s just gross.

Virtual-ly Church

Recently, I was involved in a meeting of pastors in my denomination and among the many things we talked about was Virtual “Church”. And many were extolling the virtues of Virtual “Church” during the pandemic. Moreover, they were talking about how having streaming for their services was going to be a way to attract people to their churches and build their congregations. Virtual “Church” was the big-end of the funnel. Now, believe it or not, I’m actually OK with being the lone voice of dissent in pretty much any group I’m in. In fact, I kinda relish being the lone voice of dissent. And I was the Minority Report on the issue of Virtual “Church”. And I said that I didn’t really believe in it and I didn’t intend on doing it – at least not long term as anything other than an accommodation to shut-ins and right now, for people in high-risk categories for ‘Rona.

Now, you’re probably wondering what the deal is with the quotation marks around “Church” in “Virtual ‘Church’”. Well, it’s because I don’t believe Virtual Church is…Church. Sure it’s the broadcast of a Church service. And people can participate virtually…but virtual participation is different than participation. It’s virtually participating. And I don’t mean “virtually” in the sense of via internet. I mean it in the normal use of the word: “the same, but not really.”

Because in any other part of life, we would use the word “virtual” and know that it means: the same, but not really. Virtually married ain’t married. Virtually working somewhere is different than drawing a wage. Virtually being a lawyer will get you sent to jail! I don’t want to be treated by someone who’s virtually a doctor! I don’t want our police and military to virtually be armed.

No, in many things, if not most things…in fact, pretty much all things…we recognize that: “virtually” ain’t “is”. Nobody would be happy if their employer said they were virtually going to provide health insurance! No, not virtually:  you are or you aren’t. In a lot of places in life, “virtually” has no place! It’s unacceptable. We want the genuine article, with the bona fides, and the certificate of authenticity commemorating Ernest Borgnine’s visit with the Pope at Dodger Stadium! A lot of times “virtually” just doesn’t cut it – we need the real thing.

And, what’s more, we all know this. We know that virtual and genuine are different, and we know the word is used differently. We know that there is a real and appreciable gap. So, why do we pretend that Virtual Church is Genuine Church?! We all know it’s not. We know it isn’t the same. So why do we pretend it is?

But, see the problem is that within contemporary Evangelicalism Virtual “Church” is, in fact, indistinguishable from actual church. You see, when people “attend” Virtual “Church” what are they doing? They’re watching, primarily, the sermon. That’s what Virtual “Church” is, largely, reduced to. Which is as much to say that all we’re doing of a Sunday morning is delivering content, with varying ratios of instruction and motivation.

If the only reason people come to my church is to hear me, then we have a very serious problem. 1) I ain’t that good. If you’re getting out of bed just to hear me, you need to find better sources of entertainment. 2) That means that we have a fundamental misunderstanding of what the Worship Service actually IS.

The Worship Service, aka Church, is about – if you have pearls: prepare to clutch them – worship! I know, shocker, right! The Sunday morning Worship Service is about worship. But what does that mean? Well, there are several basic answers to that, in our culture, which push things to extremes.

On one hand, there are people who believe that worshipping God is about praising Him. Others believe it’s about living for Him. And so, the people who believe it’s all about praise, they think that the important part of worship is singing and prayer. The “living for Him” crowd, well, what they want is content – they want to be instructed in how to live for Christ. Both sides are actually seeking to be better disciples. And both sides seek to make disciples. But both sides have an inadequate view of worship. That’s because worship is not, primarily about singing and praying and poetry and praises. Nor is it primarily about the intellect and being motivated to act. It’s about both, because real worship happens when we love God with all our heart, soul, and strength. The whole of human personality is comprised here. We worship by loving God. And, of course, this includes singing and praying and learning and acting in certain ways.

But here’s where we come to an impasse. You see, worshipping, which is really living out the command to love the Lord our God with everything in us, also comes with a second command which is so crucial that it’s impossible to carry out the first without carrying out the second and that’s to love our neighbors as ourselves. Moreover, we’re to love, especially, the Brethren! We are to love our brothers and sisters the way we love ourselves. And that means that we need to spend time with them. It means we have to pray with them. It means we have to sing with them – matching their key and their tempo. It means we have to smile and eat their casseroles while they smile and eat ours. It means we serve eachother communion and wash eachother’s feet and support eachother in times of need and help raise their kids in the faith as they help raise yours! It means being there for them and with them in the good times and the hard times.

You can’t virtually lay hands on someone. You can’t be virtually anointed with oil. You can’t virtually receive communion. You can’t virtually wash someone’s feet. You can’t virtually sing with people. You can’t virtually laugh with those who laugh and weep with those who weep. You can’t do these things because these are the things that need to happen in person. And what’s more, the trend to move towards a sacramentless, sterilized, anti-participational view of church is devastating because it feeds into all our worst impulses as Americans. It drives the urge to commodify and commercialize. Virtual “Church” is transactional in the worst way. Worse and worse, there’s not any accountability whatsoever. It fuel’s our isolationist tendencies which are anathema to the gospel.

Now, I get that there are places where Virtual “Church” is the best sub-optimal option. I understand that. But, the problem is that that’s not how it’s being viewed. It’s being viewed with hope as a “new way” of “doing church”. It’s being touted as the big-end of the funnel. I don’t doubt that it is! But is the little end pointing in or out?! And if it is the “new way” can someone, please, explain to me what was wrong with the “old way”? Why do we need to jettison the “old way”? Was politely requesting that people who want to be members need to come to an in person service for an hour and a half a week every few weeks such an onerous demand?

Well, yeah, I think for lots of people it was. Why? Because, for those who hate going to church, 1 of 2 things is happening. 1, the “church” they go to is not worshipping and glorifying Jesus Christ through the right preaching of the word, the right administration of the sacraments, and the right use of Church discipline, and so their “church” has become a hokey, gimmicky, dog-and-pony show, or a thinly-or-not-at-all-veiled weekly political commentary. And, truth be told even the most spectacular spectacular gets old after a while. Or 2, the people who don’t want to worship don’t want to worship because they don’t love God.

In other words, if going to your church’s “worship” seems unappealing to you it’s either because it’s not worship, you’re not a Christian, or both. But real worship, worship that rightly administers the Word, Sacrament, and Discipline, is a worship that ought to set fire to the hearts of any true believer, nomatter what their theological or denominational stripes.

The problem with the old way wasn’t the old way – it was that we left of the path and kept saying we were on the old way when really we weren’t on any-way, but wandering in circles. Sadly, tragically, too many churches have stripped down their services to the barest of bare, dry bones, trying to make the “service” sleek and smooth – making it a production; that’s all it really was. And, of course, there’s nothing wrong with a production, as long as that’s not all a worship service is. Because, as I’ve said many times, there’s a big difference between worship that’s performative and worship that’s a performance. All worship is performative – but when it becomes man-pleasing and perfunctory it becomes a performance. We’ve striven to inject passion and verve and joie de vivre by having rock concerts and coffee bars and having the hippest of all the cool-kids give us motivational speeches about how to fix our marriage, or have better sex, or have better kids, or have a better diet, or have a better job, or have a better neighborhood, or have a better government. And for many people it was a relief to take a break from theology and worship that is demanding – because let’s not pretend that the truly joy-creating and life-giving things in this world aren’t hard! The profoundest joys come from the hardest work and the deepest struggles; the purest silver comes from the hottest crucible – and in the relaxation from the demands of a worship that rightly administers the Word, Sacraments, and Discipline, which people found in the seeker-friendly movement, they began to drowse. And many began to sleep and slumber. And some who didn’t know any better thought that there wasn’t any better so they didn’t look for any better and they became lost. Seeker-friendly churches, thus, are like a Mexican resort – very nice for those who have the wealth, but beyond the walls of the hotel, you find poverty and rags and crime and death. Those who were real believers who got into seeker-friendlyism thought it was a fun change of pace; but for those who entered without the accumulated spiritual wealth of solid theology and bible teaching it became a faith-wrecking disaster. And for those who didn’t know the Gospel at all, it became an impoverishing, desperate death trap.

The fact of the matter is that whatever benefit seeker-friendlyism and the demand-free, easy-going evangelicalism had, have outused their lifefullness. Whatever spiritual life was in the preaching, teaching, discipling, and living has long since been exhausted and with no new life being injected, cool-kid evangelicalism is dying on the vine – it’s dying because it hasn’t got life within itself and therefore has none to offer to anyone else.

The simple fact is that churches in America are in trouble and going virtual is not a solution. We aren’t going to make disciple making disciples by charging headlong into the fray of tech culture. We aren’t going to do it by trying to be cloyingly nice. We aren’t going to do it by blowing with every wind of doctrine to come from our godless culture in the pathetic attempt to not have Jesus-hating people hate Jesus-loving people.

If the church in America – if our churches – if the church I pastor, is going to have a long-term future, it’s not going to be because we out worlded the world, but because we strive to be what God has called us to be: salt; light; fishers-of-men; baptizers of all nations; teachers; ambassadors for Christ; a city on a hill; a kingdom of priests; the temple of the living God; the Body of Christ! Let’s stop trying to be what the world wants and seek to become what Christ has called us to.

Obnoxious Inoffensiveness

So, I got to spend a lot of time on hold today with the State of Ohio. And, the State of Ohio has decided that during my wait time the best thing for me to have playing in the background is Muzak. Why? I ask! “WHY?!” Why would anyone decide that the best thing for me to have drilling into my aural canals while growing impatient and wasting my day, are the innocuous notes of some forgettable tune played even more forgettably by an unknown artist of unknown ability. Why? Because it’s inoffensive. There’s no need for virtuosos or virtuosity – and indeed, the music has no virtue!

Muzak is inoffensive – and that’s why it’s so obnoxious. It offends me in its inoffensiveness. It’s utter unwillingness to do anything dangerous, risky, threatening, bold, or brave evinces the cowardice of Muzak. Great music is honest. Great music is passionate. Great music is threatening.

And you might think, sure, maybe Rock and Roll and music with Lyrics can be threatening – but what about instrumental works – classical works. Oh friends, these are just as political, theological, cultural and anything else. Music, truly great music has the power to threaten the powerful and the threaten society. Beethoven famously had to change the name of his 3rd symphony from “Bonaparte” to “Eroica”. Rite of Spring caused a riot – not the good kind, but the “peaceful protest in Portland” kind. And, perhaps most famously, Shostakovich’s 5th was ironic obsequy towards Stalin and his henchmen.

In the face of the goonery and thuggery of autocracy and absolutism, music has found ways to speak without words! Like the celestial bodies in Psalm 19, classical symphonies have no speech, they use no words, but their voice is heard and sometimes the faintest notes of a pastoral can portend the Sturm und Drang coming upon society. That’s because music, even instrumental music, is saying something. Very rarely is music just pure sound without a story or a meaning.

Older musicians would have been aghast at the thought of music that didn’t have a meaning – that didn’t deliberately evoke images and ideas and even worldviews. The idea of Absolute Music – music without meaning or narrative or story – is, according to some, the aesthetic ideal. But human beings hate this. We are always imposing narrative and meaning on the notes and themes and motifs we hear in music. Of course, musical language is both shallower and deeper than the written word – particularly prose. But that doesn’t mean that people don’t seek meaning in music – because we do. We do because we look for meaning in all things, and beautiful things are no exception.

Great music has meaning; it’s based on something – it has to have a theme, and idea, something to “talk about”. And the higher and loftier the theme of the music, the higher and loftier the music can be. It’s hard to image a 3-act opera with the libretto being people reading VCR instructions. I mean, I CAN imagine that some Postmodern, Deconstructionist composer would do something like this as a “commentary” on the state of opera and that would somehow tell us how contemporary opera is racist and too tied to European musical traditions, and who says Italian is so good anyways! It would be banal for the sake of being banal – as though stating vapidity is vapid is some great discovery!

But, again, the higher the theme the higher the music can go; the loftier the subject the loftier the treatment of that subject can be. But Muzak has no theme. It’s whole point is that it has no point. It’s background noise whose sole purpose is NOT SAYING ANYTHING. But saying that you aren’t saying anything is saying something! It’s going out of your way to say that you have nothing to say. Moreover, it’s saying that there IS NOTHING TO SAY! And that, is not Music, it’s Muzak. It’s not Art, it’s Artifice. It’s ersatz, empty, fake – and worse than fake: fraudulent.

Muzak is a fraud. It’s masquerading as music, when it’s nothing of the sort – it has no meaning, no theme, no purpose. Muzak just fills the empty space where music should be. And isasmuch as it replaces music, it deadens the soul. Where music could challenge us, lift us up, enlighten us, threaten us — yes, even OFFEND us! — Muzak just exists, offering us neither beauty nor truth but vacuous vapidity, crying out vanitas vanitatum omnia vanitas. In its efforts to be inoffensive to all it’s become obnoxious and is rejected by everyone, because it says that there’s nothing worth being offensive about! Muzak’s durability exists not as a proof of its popularity, but of the cowardice of the people who manage calling services or major buildings or department stores. Everyone hears it and everyone hates it – not because it’s offensive but because it’s so inoffensive that it is awful.

And I think everyone would agree that Muzak is awful. Most people who actually care about Art would agree with me: I don’t care if I AGREE with your art, but say something! Go ahead, offend me! and say your piece; then we’ll get down to the debating, and I’ll respect you for having the courage to say something meaningful. But if you say nothing. If you say that there’s nothing to say, I’ll still be offended, and I’ll still want to debate — but I won’t respect you, because you aren’t worthy of respect. Muzak doesn’t even have the courage of nihilism — it’s utterly unworthy of respect or consideration as art because it isn’t art. Even nihilists can say that there is no meaning — Muzak says that even saying there is no meaning is meaningless. It is utterly deplorable, kitschy, horrendous, disgusting, moronic, life-denying garbage, worthy of all hate and despite. And I think you’ll agree.

Now, all I have to do is get people to agree that the same thing is true about value-neutral Secularism and this post might have a purpose other than the hot-take ranting of somebody who waited too long to get a simple question answered. But I’m not too confident. As long as the world is populated by cowards living in a divided world, value-neutrality will be seen as the safest course – a world of Muzak, trigger-warnings, safe-spaces, and godlessness.

The Best of Minds and the Worst of Minds

We live in a very strange time. We live in a time where it’s au courant to be religiously agnostic, but a terrible sin to questions whether boys can be girls. We live in the epoch of belief and the epoch of credulity. There are many people who are pushing this age in which we live to be an age of unbridled postmodern doubt. Simultaneously, the same people insist on the truth and reliability of multiculturalism and systemic racism and the rightness of Communism. It seems to me that the people driving the culture are all at once telling us that it’s wrong to have certainty and that it’s wrong to have doubt!

How can this be? Well, it just depends, right? And actually, I think that this may be one of the few things I agree with the culture on – sometimes certainty is good and sometimes doubt is good. And I’m speaking not only about technical and academic things, but some pretty everyday stuff, too.

Because you see, friends, that Wisdom, real wisdom, includes both certainty and doubt[1]. Skepticism isn’t bad, per se, but it can be. Dogmatism isn’t bad, per se, but it can be. And the struggle between Skepticism and Dogmatism is an old one. It goes back a long ways in the History of Philosophy and the History of Theology. These two are powerful poles pulling our professions and practices. But neither is good, in and of itself. Unbridled Skepticism leads to cynicism (not the philosophical kind, but the “I’m a jerk” kind) and to agnosticism and atheism. Flippancy and Destruction are the far branches of the tree of Skepticism. At the same time, unbridled Dogmatism is just as destructive. It leads to Pharisaism and Inquisitions.

The great irony, however, is that there is an insuperable Dogmatism in the most ardent Skeptic. And the most Dogmatic Fundamentalist, is the most skeptical of all.

This tug-of-war between these philosophical extremes has and will continue to carry-on. But they’re both right…ish. We shouldn’t be credulous, in the sense of a rube or naïf, fresh faced and ready to be taken by any ill wind of doctrine. We should be ready, willing, and able to test whether things be true. On the other hand, always doubting everything is just as foolish as doubting nothing. It’s unlivable. At a certain point you have to weigh evidence, and make decisions. Part of being human is living in uncertainty. Some things cannot be proven, we have to put our faith in something! The question is what. No one lives without faith. The blindest man may be the skeptic who thinks he sees clearly!

Thus, the key to Wisdom is not whether we have certainty or whether we have doubt, but rather what are the objects of our certainty and doubt. And the fact of the matter is that Wisdom and Folly, being opposites, place their certainty and their doubt in opposite things!

But how do we know about what to have certainty and what to doubt? Fortunately, the Bible tells us! Solomon says that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. In other words, real wisdom does NOT begin ex nihilo. Wisdom doesn’t begin with a tabula rasa that must needs be filled with precepts and principles before we can make sense of it. Wisdom doesn’t begin with being emptied, but being filled!

Solomon says that Wisdom begins – not continues – but BEGINS by making an emotional, affective, behavioral response to a Person. This is not some mere intellectual metaphysical commitment! It involves that – but it isn’t that, it’s more than that. Solomon doesn’t say that the beginning of Wisdom is accepting the worldview that Yahweh is the creator God to whom we owe allegiance. You can have that commitment and be a FOOL! Not until you’re ready to FEAR God can you begin to become wise! Wisdom is not, according to Solomon, a philosophical commitment, but a lifestyle. Wisdom is not about knowing but being! And, this is what we should expect if we understand what Wisdom is, in the Bible. In God’s universe, wisdom is doing right for the right reasons. Wisdom is living in harmony with God’s will. Wisdom doesn’t look the same for everyone, and this frustrates those who can’t get past their own brains, thinking that Wisdom is all about knowledge, when, frankly, knowledge has very little to do with it.

I used to say that Wisdom was applied knowledge. And while I don’t think that’s wrong, it certainly is very inadequate. Wisdom is living in harmony with God’s will. And when we live in harmony with God’s will, sometimes we’re going to be very bold in the face of opposition. Sometimes our beliefs will be attacked from all sides and even from “inside” but we don’t give up our certainty about the orthodox faith because others, even very smart others, have doubts. Wisdom means living in harmony with God’s will and that means having faith in Him and His words which will never pass away.

Wisdom also means doubting those things that the foolish world holds to be self-evident and indubitable. For instance: love is love; gender is non-binary; there are many ways to God; all problems come from racism; the world is Billions of years old; we all came from monkeys who came from pondscum who came from nothing.

I think as our world becomes both more Skeptical and more Dogmatic – or at least as we can witness the objects of Skepticism and Dogmatism changing it’s well to remember, as a general rule, that what the world holds in doubt is probably pretty certain and what the world is certain of is normally worthy of doubt.[2]

Footnotes are the best notes:

[1] It is worth questioning whether “doubt” is an ontological reality or merely the absence of certainty. If all things come from God, at least all things that are actually things, then one wonders how doubt could come from God. Perhaps, like sin, defined by Augustine as “privatio boni”, doubt is “privatio fidei”. How then can doubt be a good? I think it could be good only in the sense that it may be a recognition of our finitude and thus is an economically imposed means of honoring God. Or perhaps if we doubt things that are lies and offensive to God and therefore, sinful, it’s the privation of the privation of the good. It’s a negative of a negative and therefore positive. I’m dubious about this, though, but I’m not certain how it can be wrong. It seems inelegant. I need to do more thought on this.

[2] Expect more from me on this subject, I find it fascinating.

Getting Frienemy-dly

So, in case you haven’t heard, President Trump has decided to ban American investment in 31 Chinese companies, that he says have links to the Chinese military. And while the Chinese are crying foul and many of these companies are claiming that they have nothing to do with the Chinese military, I don’t think that matters. I’m actually willing to be more sanction-y that Trump. Whether all 31 of these companies truly has a link to the Chicom military-industrial complex is actually a moot point. And it’s moot because money is fungible. And because money is fungible any money that goes to China will, at least in part, go to the strengthening and modernization of the Chinese military. And that’s an objectively bad thing. It is objectively bad for an expansionist, murderous, totalitarian regime to increase their fighting capabilities.

Now, you might say, but Luke, if China becomes rich they’ll become a democracy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we’ve all heard that tired line before and it just ain’t true. China may be moving out of Communism by fits and starts but it’s no less an authoritarian autocracy now than it has been…it’s just now they’re transitioning into a Nationalist police-state instead of a Communist police-state. That’s not an improvement. The concentration camps for Muslim Uighurs, forced abortions, sabre-rattling, trademark and copyright infringement, slave labor – all these things show that China is a bad actor. And China IS a bad actor, and the only people who say China isn’t a bad actor are liars who know better or useful idiots who don’t. Again, because money is fungible, any investment in China – not just these 31 companies – is an investment in the Chinese military.

And I think it’s a bad thing to invest in the Chinese military. I think it’s immoral. I think that helping China is a bad thing — I think it’s immoral. But don’t expect any of our social and political betters to get on board with this. Don’t expect the NBA to start divesting from China. Don’t expect Facebook and Google or Disney and Netflix to stop investing in China. They won’t because they’re cynical. The drivers of culture in America are saying that the Scientific Method and Logic are racist, but China can put Muslims in concentration camps – and that’s OK. The Wokesters tell us silence is violence, but forced abortions, nope…no reason to speak out against THAT -- I mean, what about a Politburo’s right to choose? There’s so little real public racism in America that we’ve invented terms like Microaggression to try to conjure up hatecrimes, but do our elites talk about China, where there is real and durable racism against non-Han Chinese? I could go on, but you get the point. We have a hyper-abundance of criticism about America and yet China doesn’t seem to ever receive any…I guess China must be beyond reproach?

Or...and I know this is crazy…or maybe the rich and powerful in this country have far too much money to make off of China and since China doesn’t tolerate dissent, they keep their mouths shut to keep their pockets full. Is that a cynical view? Maybe. But I can’t see how it would be false. And the fact is that companies that knowingly aid China are knowingly hurting America for their own benefit.

This is bad behavior. This is immoral behavior. And frankly, the American public ought to have the guts to not buy products that are made in China, whenever possible. Why? Because China is a bad actor who wants to aggress and conquer and hurt America. I think we should stop buying from China because they are a bad actor who hates us. And I don’t see any good-faith argument around that fact. Trying to profit off of friendship with your enemy is either treason or stupidity.

But ya know, this is not just something that affects geopolitics and economics. This is a Spiritual concept as well. You see, brothers and sisters, an awful lot of Christians have forgotten that the world isn’t our friend!

In John 15 we read:

18 “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. 19 If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you. 20 Remember what I told you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’  If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also. If they obeyed my teaching, they will obey yours also. 21 They will treat you this way because of my name, for they do not know the one who sent me. 22 If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not be guilty of sin; but now they have no excuse for their sin. 23 Whoever hates me hates my Father as well. 24 If I had not done among them the works no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin. As it is, they have seen, and yet they have hated both me and my Father. 25 But this is to fulfill what is written in their Law: ‘They hated me without reason.’ (NIV)

OK, so let’s look at this and try to find all the places where it tells us that the world is going to love Christians? OK…searching…searching…yeah it’s not there. The world hates Christians because the world hates God. And therefore, for us to try to be friendly with the world is like trying to be friends with your sworn enemy. It ain’t a-gonna work.

The world hates us, not because of anything we can change but because of Christ. And if the world hates us because it hates Christ then there is nothing we can do to change that because they will never stop hating Christ. It’s impossible to be loved by the world and be like Christ and openly belong to Christ because the world will never stop hating Christ.

However, if Christians want to be loved by the world, here are a couple things they can do. And these won’t guarantee you’re loved, but maybe you’ll be hated less openly because you identify with Christ less clearly. OK, so, how to be friends with the world:

1)     Be ashamed of the gospel. The gospel is a hateful doctrine to the world. The Gospel says that men are wretched sinners deserving of Hell, and that there is nothing in man worth saving — but God out of His mercy saves because He delights to save. The world hates this. It is a rebuke. It insists that God is God. It insists that God is worthy of love and all our affections are, by nature, misdirected and even evil. It insists we are helpless. It insists we come to God as Spiritual beggars. The world hates the Gospel – so, if you want to cozy-up to the world, be ashamed of the Gospel.

2)     Act like a worlding. Salt stings the wounded and light burns in the eyes of those who love and live in darkness. Being salt and light causes nothing but trouble – so stop doing it. Letting your light shine simply guarantees that people who love the dark will try to extinguish it. Don’t be extinguished. I mean what will it profit a man to save his soul but lose his life? Why would you lose this whole world to gain your soul – that’s a sucker’s bet. The world is real…and angry. It’s safest to live in the now. So don’t let your light shine. Don’t be salt. In everything, do as the world. Insist on letting your mind remain conformed to the pattern of this world. Cause the moment your metamorphosize you’re gonna make enemies.

3)     Make Jesus Palatable. OK, let’s get one thing straight. Jesus went out of His way to make it clear that He does not compromise. He doesn’t compromise on sin…at all. Fornication is still a sin in Jesus’ eyes. As is homosexuality. As is transvestism and transgenderism. As is abortion. As is greed. As is pride. As is lying. As is dishonoring your parents. As is loving anything more than God. Jesus is immovable on these things, and worse and worse, his little lackey Moses condemns any and all who do these kinds of things! Jesus as the Bible describes Him is all about patriarchal, religious, messianic-Zionism. He’s so exclusivist! Making friends with the world means insisting on a gay, black Jesus – or a woman Jesus – or the communist Jesus – or the Jesus who didn’t really exist. There are all kinds of versions of people who come in His name, and to the world, they’re all better than the genuine article. Jesus, real Jesus, He’s a bigoted, racist, homophobe who must be rejected in our age of tolerance and acceptance. If you wanna be friends with the world, find out what kind of Jesus they’re tolerate or rally behind and then get behind that Jesus.

I think these are all really helpful notes on how to be friends with the world. I mean, of course James says this:

4 You adulterous people, don’t you know that friendship with the world means enmity against God? Therefore, anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. 5 Or do you think Scripture says without reason that he jealously longs for the spirit he has caused to dwell in us[b]? 6 But he gives us more grace. That is why Scripture says:

“God opposes the proud

    but shows favor to the humble.”

7 Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 8 Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. 9 Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. 10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up. (NIV)

Yeah, James tells us that trying to be friends with the world makes us God’s enemies. But what did he know?!

The Case for Neo Fundamentalism

If you’ve ever been ice-skating – or, at least, been to a rink, then you would know that for a skater to travel in a straight line, she needs, constantly, to be drifting to the right and left. Skating in a straight line is a never-ending exercise in course-correction. If you look at the grooves in the ice from a skater going straightly, you’ll see that the track goes straight, and then begins to curve away from the midline. Not only does it curve away, but it does so not at a linear rate, but exponentially. Looking at a skater’s tracks you’d see that the lines are constantly moving away from eachother and dying off while a new line begins.

If you were to look at Church history, you’d notice, largely, the same phenomenon. Theology is, essentially, a responsive discipline. Very few theologians are, let alone should be, doing speculative theology which attempts to answer questions nobody is asking. And moreover, the most influential theologians in America are not the people we call theologians. Or even pastors! talk show hosts, musicians, and television script-writers are far and away more influential than Academic and Professional theologians – or pastors. This happens for a variety of reasons, most of which are bad, but it remains, nevertheless, true that theology is shaped not by the people best educated and trained to shape it, but by those who have control over Ear-Gate and Eye-Gate.

But culture is not static either. Culture is constantly moving somewhere and the Church, for good and for ill, responds to those changes. Thus, in Church history, we’re not always looking at theological changes wrought through pure speculation. In fact, we’re rarely looking at changes wrought through pure speculation – but, rather, theological shifts come about in response to heresy, cultural dynamics, and personality conflicts. Moreover, theology, throughout history, has always moved from responsive to reactionary. Why? Because we’re humans and we overdo things. We become so afraid of one error that we deliberately enter into another – wittingly or unwittingly. Lewis’ Screwtape brilliantly observed: “The game is to have them all running about with fire extinguishers when there is a flood, and all crowding to that side of the boat which is already nearly gunwale under.”

And so what happens? The Church begins moving towards Christ – and then it begins to err. Then, eventually its errors are so onerous or egregious that some people split off and attempt to create a pure(r) movement. And this works…for a while…until it doesn’t and then another corrective is in place.

This is not new – heresy and recalcitrance lead to splits. And now is the time when we will see whether another split is in the offing. But first, let’s have a bit of history. In the 1800s scholars in Europe, influenced by the “Enlightenment”, principally in Germany, began to question many things. And in an effort to “save” Christianity, a guy named Schleiermacher, formed Liberal Christianity. And this began to move Protestantism away from a historically reliable faith. Others in Germany would attack the reliability of the Old and New Testaments with Higher Criticism. Well, the Higher Critics and Liberals eventually influenced all the mainline protestant denominations. In response to this there was a group of Conservative Christian theologians who wrote a book refuting the claims of Liberals and Higher Critics called The Fundamentals. Those who followed the line of traditional orthodox Christianity, who believed in the historicity of the Biblical material, as well as the reliability and inspiration of the texts, were known as “Fundamentalists”. The Fundamentalists held wide influence, but became TOO exclusive and became alienating and alienated because of certain positions on certain social issues. In essence, they were too small-tent. But the Fundamentalists didn’t go away, rather, those who wanted to be big-tent started calling themselves “Evangelical”. They didn’t stop caring about the fundamentals of the faith, but they also cared about the Evangel, and placed witnessing for Christ at a premium.

But from the very beginning, there were “Evangelicals” who were Fundamentalists-By-Another-Name as well as Liberals-Out-Of-Water and of course there was a great multitude in between. But, over the past 40 years, where the Church stands on social issues has become increasingly important. Moreover, in the past 20 years there has been a group that has been actively, vociferously, and unappreciatedly trying to move the liberalizing Evangelicalism back towards traditional orthodoxy. This group was dubbed the “Neo-Fundamentalists” and, of course, as we all know, Fundamentalists are bad – and “Neo” ANYTHING is bad. So Neo-Fundamentalists are doubleplusungood. And if you do a quick search on the internet and you’ll find lotsa folk decrying neo-fundies and Neo-Fundamentalism, proper.

But why? Well, basically, because Neo-Fundamentalists tend to be aligned with Republicans and Conservative social agenda. Why? Because many NFs are single-issue voters. And that single-issue is abortion. Also, because lots of NFs reject a whole host of radical and godless narratives and positions being foisted upon the American public by Democrats: transsexualism, gay marriage, socialism, the undermining of the family, (and now joining the list) the incoherent, repugnant, and evil Critical Race Theory. In other words, NFs are going Red because everyone else if going Woke. And, of course, going Red meant going Trump and that is the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit!

Now, people define words differently, so let me say what I mean by Neo-Fundamentalism, or at least a form of it that deserves to have a case made for it. But first I want to say what my kinda NF is NOT.

It is not: KJV Onlyism; Beholden to Calvinism or Arminianism; or Primarily Political.

It is: a corrective movement within Evangelicalism which seeks to a) restore traditional orthodox protestant Christian theological norms b) reestablish Biblical and traditional praxis c) reform our current liturgies to better reflect Biblical and Historical patterns. In essence, the kind of NF I can get behind seeks to reform the Evangelical church to restore it to: orthodoxy; orthopraxy; and orthopathy.

Why is this needed? Because, simply, far too many “Evangelicals” are going Woke.

Is Evangelicalism salvageable? I dunno.

Is Neo-Fundamentalism divisive? Truth is only as divisive as the lies it repudiates.

Could this backfire? I don’t know how serving God better could backfire.

Could I be wrong? Sure – but I don’t think I am.

Where do we go from here? Aye, there’s the rub.

Here’s what I’ve been saying for years. If your pastor is Woke – get rid of him. If your pastor rejects the literal historicity of the teaching, miracles, death, burial, resurrection, ascension, session, and coming return of Jesus Christ – get rid of him. If he rejects the Nicene faith – get rid of him. If he believes the Bible is not God’s inspired, authoritative, inerrant, infallible word – get rid of him. If you can’t – leave. If your church is spending all its time on social agenda and not on making disciples and sharing the gospel – leave. Stop giving your time, talent, and treasure to a Church that compromises on the essentials of the faith. Give your pastor or church or denomination the option: reform or I leave. Are ultimata hard lines? Yes. Are they necessary? Sometimes.

Why do I draw such a hard line? A few reasons. Let me lay them out rapidly. First, nobody should be gorging on Wokeism or theological Liberalism – it isn’t good for your soul and if you believe, as I believe, that their teachings are heresy, then to help them in their heresy would be to violate a Biblical command! 2 John 1:10 warns us not even to let false teachers into our homes, let alone give them money! Jude’s words[1] are even stronger – we are to hate even the clothing stained by the sinful flesh. Which, of course, leads us to our second point: when you give your time, talent, and treasure to aid a false teacher, you are complicit in their false teaching. It isn’t as though there aren’t options. If you choose to help support a false teacher, then you are, according to the Bible (read: God) helping them to do more false teaching. You are culpable for that. Third, if the Church goes Woke, we have no message: the lost cannot be saved and our lampstand will be snuffed out. I could go on…but why? Are these three not enough?

The simple fact of the matter is that it’s coming into choosing time. Soon and very soon, it’s going to be time to pick sides. I do not believe that Evangelicalism can continue on this divergent path much longer because a house divided cannot stand. Jesus agrees with me, as does all of Church History. Evangelicalism is either going to Reform, go entirely Liberal, or split. And as it’s headed now, it looks to split. But I don’t wanna be the first or the last rat to leave a sinking ship. So, I’m sticking with it, for now. I’m still an “Evangelical”; outsiders would probably call me a “Neo-Fundamentalist” and theologically, I am. But I’m still trying to change those within our gigantic tent and reform it by kicking some of the raccoons and ‘possums eating our marshmallows and rifling through the trash and tightening the guylines. Let us seek reform first, and if reform is impossible, then let’s leave Evangelicalism…knowing that Evangelicalism, in truth, left us.

A Footnote:
[1] It must be said that there is a growing body of scholarship which questions whether Jude was addressing false-teachers at all! The con-case is well laid out in Part I of a II part series (Part II is yet to be released) by Herbert Bateman. See: Herbert W. Bateman IV, “The Minority Report: A Different Assessment for Interpreting Jude, Part 1,” Bibliotheca Sacra, no. 705 (January-March 2020): 91-105.

The Soul as the Self

There is a natural and inescapable observation that there are material and immaterial realities.  Moreover, the material and the immaterial interact: the spiritual and the somatic; the temporal and eternal; the mundane and the transcendent. Theories of the soul, both in Platonism and in most of Christianity are, largely, attempts to posit a “part” of the human person which is, not material but can interact with the material. Thus, for most, the “soul” is the hypostasis, substance, form, or part of the human person which functions as mysterious an immaterial command center – the ghost in the machine[1] – or which justifies the interaction of material and immaterial within the human person. Thus, for many, if not most, the “soul”, as it is commonly conceived, is posited to account for the presence of and interaction with the immaterial within and by material beings. In many ways, though it is not stated to be such, the soul is a proposed answer to the mind-body problem. This makes defining “soul”, in a Western context, so influence by Platonism and Christianity, particularly difficult because the parameters of what the soul is have already been set by the question. Thus, many definitions of soul are large-scale exercises in philosophical question begging.

But for the Christian, the problem cannot simply be erased by saying that the soul is not a thing, because the Bible is rife with the uses of נפשׁ (nephesh) and ψυχή (psoochay). Since these words are translated with the English word “soul”, it is incumbent upon Christian philosophers to explain what the Bible means when these words are used, and to do so in a philosophically satisfactory manner. Thus, the Christian philosopher is at an impasse. The soul is a loaded term. The nature of the question forces us to a predetermined and overly narrow set of explanations for the Biblical meaning of “soul”. Once we begin with the premise that the soul explains the immaterial in the material, we can never escape that premises in a satisfactory way. The framing of the question forces us to a conclusion that the soul is either a ghost in the machine or some hylomorphic form, or that it doesn’t exist at all. But I do not believe that that is the soul. I believe that based upon the best scriptural interpretations we can make, applied to our best philosophical methods and traditions, we can arrive at the understanding that the soul is neither less, nor more, than the self.[2]

I recognize that this is a minority view, which jettisons much of the most venerated anthropology to ever come from philosophers and theologians. But I think that the “soul is the self” is the least problematic view, with the most explanatory power. In what follows I will examine: the Partialist view, advocated by Plato[3] and modern Trichotimists and Dualists; the Materialist view, advocated by atheists (primarily); the Hylomorphic view, advocated by Aristotle[4] and which is very similar to Christian Integrated Complexity. I will weigh the merits of each and also demonstrate that all of these views fail and point us to the need for a new way of looking at “soul”.

I was a Trichotomist for most of my life. I understood Body, Soul, and Spirit, to be aspects of personality that corresponded to and interacted with the Physical, the Psychological, and Spiritual realms; this corresponds to Science, Philosophy, and Theology; it corresponds with Christ, the Father, and the Spirit; et cetera. I still believe that these three realms are real. But dividing the human person into 3 parts, while elegant, and coherent has problems. The soul is often conflated with the spirit in the Old Testament. Moreover, a tripartite view really relies entirely on Hebrews 4:12. Also, there are more “parts” that are listed, why only these 3? Moreover, it presupposes that personalities in the spiritual realm cannot interact with material or psychological (thoughts, emotions, volition, etc.) Trichotomism answers some questions very well. But is ultimately unsatisfactory.

Dualism has much to merit it. It recognizes the eternality of personality, that there is more to the world than the material, the reality of the transcendent. Plato’s forms even correspond strongly to an Edwardsian view of Christian typology, where all things in the Universe are types of Christ. Moreover, the separability of consciousness[5] from the body within Christian theology strongly supports the Dualist (and Trichotomist) view.

But Dualism fails for similar reasons as Trichotomism. It conflates the psychological and the spiritual, though we recognize that they are different. God is not pure thought, He is Spirit, though He has the capacity for the psychological. Moreover, Dualism fails to account for how the soul and the body interact. Dualism says, in essence: “If we can’t explain HOW the immaterial and material interact, we’ll posit a “soul” to explain it.” But it doesn’t explain anything, it merely accepts the immaterial in humanity as a first principle and then calls it “soul”. Moreover, because the soul is something placed in the body rather than an inextricably linked aspect of the total person Dualism (and Trichotomism) eventually devolve into the disintegration of the person and the denigration of the body.

On the other extreme, of course, is hard Materialism, which denies the existence of any kind of immaterial reality. All there is is matter. And this simply cuts the Gordian Knot. Unfortunately for the hard Materialist, describing a mechanism doesn’t explain away a phenomenon. Love doesn’t necessarily become reduced to chemical reactions simply because we can describe the chemical reactions. The Materialist has to prove (or at least convince people) that there is nothing immaterial working in conjunction with the material – a difficult task, since it’s hard to prove a universal negative.[6] It’s also an unpleasant view. It also overstates our realistic level of confidence in our knowledge of biological mechanisms and processes. Materialism cannot give a satisfactory explanation of even consciousness. It cannot explain known phenomena, why should we accept its take on the unprovable?

So, we can see Trichotomism and Dualism attempt to explain the soul as the immaterial “part” of the person that interacts with the material. Materialism attempts to explain the soul away as something that doesn’t exist because the immaterial doesn’t exist.

Aristotle seems to be between Scylla and Charybdis. Yet, Aristotle’s view is so abstruse that it leaves much to be desired. I agree with him that the immaterial is integrated seamlessly into the material. But I disagree that it is inseparable. For Plato and the Dualist/ Trichotomist the soul is part of the self and can and will be separated from the body upon death. But not for Aristotle. Because he views the soul as merely the form of the self, when the body dies, so does the soul. Aristotle in some ways comes closer to the truth than Plato. But he leans too far into Materialism. Aristotle is right in understanding that something directs the human person, and even animals. He’s right to think that trying to divvy up the person is a mistake; he’s wrong say the soul cannot survive death.

And so, it seems I’ve painted myself into a corner. I reject Partialism because the soul is too thing-y. I reject Hylomorphism because the soul is not thing-y enough. I reject Materialism because it denies the existence of a soul!

But what if this whole time we’ve missed the point? What if the soul is the self? All attempts to narrow down what the self, eventually fall prey to a reductio ad absurdum. The soul is inextricably linked to the body because it IS the body. The body is part of the soul, the soul is not part of the body, or a ghostly inhabitant thereof. The mind, consciousness, will, reason, spirit, these are all parts of the soul, because the soul is the self.

Genesis makes it plain that the “soul” comes into being when the Spirit of God is breathed into the nostrils of the earth which had been formed into the shape of a man. Adam, like the beasts, becomes a נפשׁ חיה (Nephesh Chaiyah). Whatever God did, he did to matter. But the text doesn’t say he put a נפשׁ חיה into the dust. It says the dust became a נפשׁ חיה. This is of course consonant with OT usage of  נפשׁ and NT usage of ψυχή which are used synonymously with “life”.

But how then can the soul be separated from the body, as we know to be “absent from the body is present with the Lord”? Again, this is the wrong way of thinking about this. The soul doesn’t leave the body, the body is separated from the soul. All the other aspects of self, the mind, the will, the emotions, consciousness, memories, and so on, these all remain “parts” of the soul. The body doesn’t lose a soul at death – the soul loses a body.

How does this work? I don’t know. I’m not attempting to explain how this works. I’m simply saying that the best philosophical understanding of “soul” is that the soul is the self. Is consciousness a ghost in the machine? Maybe? Perhaps the immaterial aspects of human life are the “breath of God” which have unified with the dust of the earth and been animated (literally). But if that’s the case there’s no proving it. And there is no disproving it, either. It cannot be verified or falsified.

Thus, positing a ghost in the machine because we cannot understand the mechanism through which consciousness works and how God and spirits interact with bodies is a thesis that should be considered carefully. Equating that ghost in the machine with the soul is simply a “soul of the gaps”. It is a thesis – but a superfluous thesis.

I believe in soul because God divinely inspired the Biblical authors to use the words נפשׁ and ψυχή. But when everything is weighed, we find that any attempt to separate soul from self creates more problems than it solves. Partialism posits the soul to explain the presence of the imaterial and must explain whence the ghost comes and how it works, calling the ghost the “soul” doesn’t answer anything. Materialism denies the existence of the soul altogether and rejects the reality of parts of the self, which are typically understood to be immaterial. Hylomorphism escapes the mind-body problem, and accepts the reality of the immaterial, but fails because it rejects life after death.[7] In other words. Materialism says nothing. Plato and Dualists/ Trichotomists say too much. Hylomorphists don’t say enough.

The simple, elegant, most philosophically durable answer is that what we call the soul is no more nor less than the self. It doesn’t overstate its case and posit something unprovable and problematic. It doesn’t deny the reality of the immaterial. It accounts for life after death. Viewing the soul as the self allows us to recognize that human (and animal) personalities are complex and combine material and immaterial aspects. Moreover, it handles the biblical data with the most integrity – not importing Platonic presuppositions on what “soul” is.

While I have no doubt that this answer is underwhelming and disappointing to many, especially those who, like me, fancy themselves anthropologists, it seems to me that this answer is the best available. The many definitions of soul, I believe, arose because people understood that human personality is complex and mysterious.[8] The Western concept of soul was developed to explain the mystery of personality. The philosophical discussion continues because all the answers to the question of what the soul is begin with the premise that the soul has to explain the complexity of human personality. Perhaps we must simply accept that humans are complex, and God has not given us knowledge on how we exist in complexity. We are the dust of the earth animated by the breath of God. To say less than that is sub-Christian. To say more than that is to enter into error. The self, in all its complexity, is a נפשׁ חיה.

Footnotes:

[1] I’ve written on my personal website at some length on similar issues, with some overlap. See:

Luke M Nagy, “The Ghost in the Machine” last modified August 17, 2020, accessed September 24, 2020. https://www.lukenagy.com/blog/2020/8/17/the-ghost-in-the-machine.

Luke M Nagy, “Christianity Confirms Brain Science” last modified August 12, 2020, accessed September 24, 2020, https://www.lukenagy.com/blog/2020/8/12/christianity-confirms-brain-science.

[2] Of course, this means I must define self. But this, again, need not trouble us. The self is the “I” of the speaker, with all that that means. My body is I; my mind is I; my will is I; my reason is I; my emotions are I; my memories are I; all these aspects of personality have a Gestalt and form the unique “I”. And this is true of all people. I am me; you are you. And this is true of animals. One can say neither more nor less.

[3] Steven M. Cahn, Classics of Western Philosophy, 8th Edition, Phaedo (Indianapolis: Hacket Publishing Company, 2012).

[4] Steven M. Cahn, Classics of Western Philosophy, 8th Edition, On The Soul, Nichomachean Ethics (Indianapolis: Hacket Publishing Company, 2012).

[5] Especially II Corinthians 5:8.

[6] Of course, he could rush to posit Lex Parsimoniae, but that would require all things being equal – which they are not – and they are unacceptably not to a person who has accepted Christian metaphysics.

[7] There are of course other issues with Aristotle’s theory that are merely “piling on” as I reject any system that does not attribute for survival of the soul after death.

[8] Of course, this leads us to a significant philological question: must a word be restricted to its original meaning? Where did the idea of ψυχή come from? Did the first Hellenes have a correct theological anthropology? Or did the word reflect their own cultural understandings that changed over time? Are Christians to be bound to the first Hellenic view? Or do we accept that the word attempted to explain, without revelation, real phenomena, even if wrongly?

To Your Tents, O Israel!

One of the saddest points in world history, let alone Biblical History is the division of Israel into the Northern and Southern Kingdoms. This schism was the result of God’s decree – but it also occurred because of VERY human choices. When we look at I Kings 12 we can see that although the people were willing to submit to Rehoboam the son of Solomon, they desired that the government shrink. Solomon massively expanded government and although the nation was exceedingly financially prosperous, the breakneck pace of nation-building was exhausting. Multitudes were involved in building up the army and the cavalry and all the King’s various building projects. People were neglecting their own farms and fields – they were neglecting their own inheritances to serve the King and devote themselves to public works. Although taxes weren’t the problem, the non-stop demands on the people were.

And the people demand a respite.

And Rehaboam – more fool he – decided to double down and refuse to hear their pleas and said that his little finger was bigger than Solomon’s waist (N.B. waist is a euphemism). He said Solomon whipped them, but he’d scourge them with scorpions. He was going to not lighten their load but make it heavier and heavier. He thought that the way to keep them down was to threaten to put his boot on their necks.

The plan backfired.

Rehoboam was nothing like his father. He was a chump. And Israel knew he was a chump. And then we hear a man shout out from the crowd some very poetic and ominous words:

“What share do we have in David,

               what part in Jesse’s son?

To your tents, O Israel!

               Look after your own house, David!”

And upon these words the nation was divided – and only Messiah will reunite the people of Israel.

Fast forward to right now. What do we have? We have division. We have the kind of division that is not merely superficial, and not merely heated, but he have divisions that cannot be crossed. We, as a nation, are so different in our overall outlook on the world, our metaphysical commitments and presuppositions are so at odds that there is no realistic chance for reunion. There are, so far as I can see things, only 3 options: Wokeism and radical, Statist, Secular Paganism is going to conquer; Christianity, and Theistic Classical Liberalism are going to conquer; or the country is going to be divided – because it can’t keep going like this.

The way I see it, something is about to change. For years and years Blue States have flouted the Federal Government – think of Sanctuary Cities, federal property destruction, et cetera – and they’ve done so with impunity – though it did impugn their character.

But my, my, my how the turn tables. Now with all the corruption and Socialism leaking into the Federal Governement, Red States are going to have to answer a simple question: are they going to allow the Federal Government to govern against the will of their sovereign states, or are they going to refuse to comply or capitulate? Will Red States play Calvinball with the Feds or will they go home?

I believe that some states – particularly very red states that have enough internal wealth to not be “greenmailed” into compliance will simply disobey. And when push comes to shove, states like Texas and Utah are gonna say, “What share have we in Washington? what inheritance in the Feds? To your tents, O Red States; look after yourselves, Commies!” Or, I dunno, something like that.

The fact of the matter is that sooner or later push does come to shove. And what happens then, no one can foresee. But I believe that the days of the Union may not be many. I can easily see us moving towards a Confederation – maybe not de jure, but de facto. I’m not, of course, advocating the dissolution of the Union. While I would PREFER a Confederacy, we don’t’ live in one. We live in a Constitutional Union. I’m a Unionist because I don’t have a time machine to go back and warn Hamilton and the Federalists of what will some day come to pass.

But a few things do seem clear to me. Nothing in this world lasts forever – and that includes governments. All human institutions have a shelf life. Moreover, sometimes phoenixes are born out of the ashes. It is the foolish folly of fools to think that America will last forever. It will not – at least not in its current form. Three question seem exceedingly important for us as a body politic to come to terms with: what can it become? what should it become? and what will it become? All three matter, and while we can never answer them perfectly I can say with confidence that if America doesn’t find some kind of way to cross the chasms that divide us, soon and very soon, some Stentorian voice will cry out above the din of the disaffected and call us hence, and with clarity we will heed the clarion and we will obey that voice out of the wilderness and we will depart, never to return.

A Theology of Hope

Introduction

Hope, in the world; don’t hope in the world.

Hope is one of the most important and most often neglected aspects of Christian theology. We talk about hope and we think about hope and we use the word probably multiple times a day, every day. Hope, as an idea and as a word is, probably, one of the most common theological terms used in routine speech. While love is probably the most used, hope comes in a strong second.

And yet, I don’t think that Christians, broadly speaking, know what hope is, in a theological sense. Sure, we know what it means as a routine noun – but as a theological expression of the Biblical concept – that’s a different story altogether. Because the reality is that theological hope and routine hope are not in any way, shape, manner, or form, the same thing.

Just as not as the world gives, gives Jesus peace, in the same way not as the world gives, gives Jesus hope. The hope that comes from Jesus is not different in quantity but in quality. He has an altogether different kind of hope. But, unfortunately, this word is so laden with cultural meaning, it’s hard to get at what the Bible means when God speaks of hope. If we want to move forwards in understanding my thesis that there is a difference of monumental importance between “hoping in the world” and “hoping, in the world” we’re going to need to understand hope.

Put simply, Christian hope is the confident expectation of some future good. It doesn’t mean desire, although desire and hope have a large Ven-diagram overlap. Yes, we desire the things we hope for but not all desires are hopes. Some things we desire, but have no confident expectation that the thing we desire will ever come to pass! I’ve preached on this, at length, so I don’t want to spend much time defending my assertion. So, instead of trying to defend this with word studies and exegetical arguments I want to simply show that philosophically hope can’t be desire, or pie in the sky wishing, it has to involve a confident expectation.

Hope is one of the 3 that abide in the believer, along with faith and love. If Hope could be in something deceptive – something that will never happen, then it’s a deceitful hope. It’s a lie. And since hope comes from God, then hope can’t be a lie because it’s impossible for God to lie!

Now, you might say, “well, OK, but maybe as humans we are putting our hope in the wrong OBJECT, just as we can put our faith and our love in the wrong object.” And of, course, I would agree and then thank you for proving my point. Hope that won’t come true isn’t godly hope because God wouldn’t give us a reason to confidently expect something that will never happen. Hoping for something that will never happen is worldly hope. Worldly hope is just a desire. Godly hope is confident expectation. So, with our understanding of hope, let’s try to unpack what I mean when I say that there’s an eternal difference between “hoping in the world” and “hoping, in the world.”

The Argument

Recently my wife and I went on a vacation to Lancaster. We loved it. I, being a Mennonite, found it fascinating to see Mennonite culture celebrated. I found it saddening to see it commercialized in a kitschy way. But more than that, I was reminded of the subtle but powerful pull that that lifestyle has for a lot of people.

I could EASILY see myself running away to live on a sustenance farm – away from people. I could see myself living in a commune, like the Hutterites, or a Monastic Community. I could very easily go and isolate myself. I could very easily and very happily move my stuff to the middle of some vast forest and live in my library, reading and writing and never having to see or deal with anyone in the world ever again. I could move far enough away that elections wouldn’t matter, socialism wouldn’t matter, taxes wouldn’t matter, riots wouldn’t matter. Sitting in the silent peace of my mountain library I would just exist as a happy hermit.

Or at least that’s my dream.

So why don’t I do it?

3 reasons. 1, God commands me not to. 2, It is exceedingly selfish and sinful. 3, it wouldn’t really bring me satisfaction. And this is important for us to understand. We can’t just run away from the world. We have to engage with it. We live in it, for goodness’ sake, we have to deal with it. Christians need to engage with the culture and with politics if for no other reason than because we need an entre to show people Jesus. Obviously there are other and some better reasons to engage, but at a baseline level, we can’t just live in isolation because then we won’t have a witness – we won’t be able to rightly testify to Christ by word and deed. We are to be IN the world, but not OF it.

This is crucial. So, let’s think about this. If this is a command – which I take it to be. The it is a sin to be in the world AND of it – those would be worldlings, AKA unbelievers. There are also those who are not in the world, but not of it – those would be true believers in isolation. And then there are those who are not in the world AND ARE of it – those would be false believers living in isolation. And those are sinning the worst! Shockingly, in some ways, it might be worse for your soul to live in a Christian commune as a pseudo-Christian than to live a life of open and gross immorality. The worldling who is in the world, at least isn’t a hypocrite. But the Monk who denies the Master IS!

I see the appeal of running away, I really do – but in the end, it’s disobedient, cowardly, and purposeless…it may also make you a Pharisee, twice a son of Hell!

But what does this have to do with hope? Well, the reason I bring this up is because all sincere Christians STRUGGLE, and I mean struggle, to walk that line of being IN the world and not OF it. We recognize that God has commanded us to live, work, play, eat, drink, and be merry in this world – with worldlings – and try to testify to Christ. We recognize that we need to live our lives among sinners in a sinful culture with sinful values and also not become like them, but help them be transformed into the image of Christ. What does this mean practically? This is a hard question, and, unfortunately for those who like black and white, largely a matter of individual conscience.

But what should become obvious is that we, as citizens of Heaven, still have responsibilities here on earth. We recognize that while our Mission is to make disciple-making disciples, part of that means striving to spread God’s Shalom, even in a lost and dying world. We seek to Edenify the world, even though we know it’s a failing task! Why? Because we’re stewards and the stewardship we’ve been given includes this lost and dying world. Because we’re stewards of our life, liberty, time, talent, treasure, sexuality, intellect, emotions, wills, influence, friendships, churches, communities, and everything else – that everything else encompasses out earthly citizenship. If everything about me is a sacred gift from God that I’m to steward, then so is my American citizenship. Since my American citizenship is a sacred stewardship, then I have a stake in politics. I have a responsibility to God about whether and how I vote. I have a responsibility in how I help to shape this Republic. And I believe that the American Republic, for all it’s flaws and evils, is still the best place on God’s earth today – if for no other reason than that it’s the best house on a bad street. America has, has had, and always will have problems, and serious ones. But that doesn’t mean that it cannot be improved, and it certainly doesn’t mean I shouldn’t strive to improve it. My personal hero William Wilberforce saw very clearly the problems with 18th Century England. He was aware – yet he worked to make England like Eden. In the same way, I want America to be a nation that loves and serves God – not with lipservice, but in truth. I want a nation of righteous laws, ruled by righteous people. I think that this is an OBJECTIVE good. It is objectively good to have godly laws governing the godly. And I believe that America CAN be revived. I believe she CAN turn to Christ. I believe that the ship can be saved and we can reform and we can right things and that if we turn to Christ, and stop sinning, and do good, then America’s best days might be ahead. I’m hoping, in the world.

But that doesn’t seem to be the trend. America seems to be dead-set and determined to murder babies, outlaw Christ, and play the Socialist game. We’re falling towards secular paganism, aka Wokeism and it looks ugly. The Academy is godless and going woke…and this includes the public school system at all levels. Culture is godless. And more and more young people are godless. I’m not hoping in the world.

You see, on one hand I have the confident expectation that if we repent and turn to Christ He will save our nation. But I’m not hoping that worldlings will suddenly do godly things without becoming godly! My hope isn’t in this world.

Last night’s election can be interpreted in a whole host of ways if you’re a Christian. And although we don’t know the results, yet, one thing stands out very clearly to me: God gives nations leaders they deserve – and sometimes even better leaders than they deserve. But, on the whole, a godless, feckless, murderous, adulterous, greedy, and corrupt nation should expect leadership that will be godless, feckless, murderous, adulterous, greedy and corrupt. When we live in a nation that is full of sin we should expect to be punished for that sin. And one of the most, if not the single most, common ways for God to punish a nation and national sin is to allow natural consequences to play out. In other words, God let’s us reap what we’ve sown. When we sow to the flesh, we reap corruption – and sometimes, by His grace, we get slightly less corrupt corruption than we deserve; but God is not mocked and one of the things that is an invincible bulwark against mockery is human nature. Godless people cannot be trusted to make good political decisions. How can they be? How can a person who hates God, the Author of Life, the Giver of all Good Gifts, the Font of Wisdom, He who knows the End from the Beginning, the Almighty – if you hate and reject Him what should you expect to get?! If you separate yourself from the Light why should you not expect darkness.

Whatever happens after the votes are tallied 2 things are clear.

First, Christians have placed far too much hope in the world. Far too many Christians’ behavior demonstrates that they see America’s problems as primarily political and not moral. And since they see them as political, they believe that Abortion, Cultural Disintegration, and Socialism are political phenomena. They are not. The are theological phenomena with political ramifications. Theology is the Essence and Politics are the Accidents. We fail to see the theological root of our problems because we’ve put our hope in this world.

Second, America becoming a Socialist state may be the only path to revival. I’ve been saying for years that I do not believe there will be revival in this nation until there is persecution. So, while Christians lament that a majority of adult humans would vote for a party of unfettered infanticide, riot apologetics, Socialism, and Wokeism, remember that God is in control.

Remember that God works out all things for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose. Will an America reshaped in the image of Joe Biden, Kamala Harris and all their ilk be an objectively worse place to live? Absolutely. But fertile soil is full of feces and death. Perhaps the best thing for the Gospel in this country is for us to face mistreatment and persecution. Will that be objectively better for the godless woke worldlings? No. It will only heap up their sin to the full measure. It will redound to their more complete condemnation. But for believers it may be the crucible which purifies us.

In closing I’d like to quote the words of an anonymous poem that have come to mean much to me. As Americans anticipate our country going down the tubes, let’s remember that while we can hope, in this world, we must never hope in the world. We need to look to Jesus. We need to trust him that when our candidates don’t win, that He’s still in control, and He’s doing all He does for the good of His Church – to make His Bride more Beautiful!

Is there no other way, Oh God,

Except through sorrow, pain and loss?

To stamp Christ's likeness on my soul,

No other way except the cross?

And then a voice stills all my soul,

That stilled the waves of Galilee,

"Cans't thou not bear the furnace

If midst the flames I walk with thee?

I bore the cross, I know its weight,

I drank the cup I hold for thee.

Cans't thou not follow where I lead?

I'll give thee strength, lean hard on Me."

Excursus: A Discourse on Method

(If you aren’t interested in theological method you can ignore this §)…(but is it worth the risk?…)

So how do we discern what the Bible means when it speaks of hope? Well, to answer this question I’m going to explain a little about my theological method. And I hope that if you understand my method you’ll be able to use it yourself and hopefully do better theology!

First, in my method I always try to do as much apophatic theology as possible before doing any cataphatic. Now, if that sounds fancy and incomprehensible, it’s OK. There’re just fancy $4 words that I’m throwing out, for no other reason than to give you the vocab so you have a category of thought. Apophatic theology is basically theology by eliminating wrong answers. It’s the Via Negativa – the negative way. Apophatic theology tries to answer questions by eliminating wrong answers. Let me give you an example.

Pretend you’re a homicide detective and you’re on a family vacation with the kids and you decide to take an overnight train ride through the mountains and then, suddenly, DUN, DUN, DUNNNNNNN, it’s discovered that there was a murder on the train. And so, you, being a world-famous detective, set about to solve this mystery. Well, what’s the first thing you’ll do? You’ll eliminate all possible suspects to narrow down the field. You eliminate all small children. You eliminate everyone who was physically incapable of committing the murder. Let’s say the man was strangled – that takes a lot of strength, so you are only looking at men, so you can eliminate all women. And you can go on and on and on trying to eliminate categories of people and individuals by saying they CAN’T have done the murder. It’s a lot like playing Guess Who – incidentally the fun DOES end when you play Guess Who, but it’s still a very useful game for teaching children logic.

So, all apophatic theology, or apophasis, is is simply eliminating as many possible wrong answers to limit the field of potentially right answers. But only eliminating bad answers rarely gives you the right answer in theology – not on the complex and deep questions. For instance, let’s say because of all the evidence in the case, you, the master detective, you have narrowed it down to 3 suspects. Well, that’s not good enough. You can’t put all three on trial for murder and say, well, I know it has to be one ‘a them! No. Now we need cataphatic theology.

 Cataphatic theology, is theology by making positive assertions, making claims that you want to defend. Let’s go back to the Murder on the Train example. Let’s say now that you’ve got it down to 3 potential killers, you decide it’s time to claim you know who the killer is. Now, of the 3 men, all three are strong enough, and had access to the victim and were seen around the victim near the time of his death. So, they had means and opportunity. But let’s say only one of them had a motive. Let’s say one of these three men was the victim’s nephew and sole heir to the Uncle’s fortune who had, DUN, DUN, DUNNNNNNN, just found out that he’d been written out of the will because of his profligate lifestyle! Yes, yes, good, good, now you have means, opportunity, AND motive. Now you’ve got a case.

Theology works just like this. Theologians try to answer questions by saying, ok, let’s think about this question – doesn’t matter what it is, and they say, OK, let’s eliminate as many answers as we can, as fast as we can and narrow the answer down to a small number of candidates (incidentally, this is a good way to play chess!) then after you’ve gotten rid of as many as possible and have your small number of candidates you weigh the evidence once again and you make a positive assertion and you develop an argument to defend your assertion. Because you need evidence. You need negative AND positive evidence. It’s not enough to look at all the people on the train and eliminate everyone but one guy and say, “well it has to be him”. No, it doesn’t. Just because you can’t eliminate him doesn’t mean he did it! Someone could have sneaked on. Someone could be hiding. You may have eliminated someone whom you shouldn’t’ve! You can’t just say, this is the only thing that it’s not not. You have to prove that it is! You need negative AND positive evidence. And you say, well, Luke, if I have positive evidence and I can prove that Nephew Billy is the killer, why do I need negative evidence? I have sufficient positive evidence! Do you? You KNOW, do you, that Billy worked alone? You know he had no accomplices? Well, prove it. Bad theology has positive or negative evidence. Good theology has both.

Bon Voyage Courage

The greatest danger of Secularism in the political arena is not that it will encourage radicals, but that it will discourage the average. The simple fact of the matter, when we study human nature, is that people are, by nature, cowards. People are cowardly cowards who do cowardly things. And, of course, when I say cowardly, I don’t mean that people are inherently risk averse. I think the data are rather fuzzy on that count. Rather, I mean that when people are demanded, by circumstances personal or impersonal, to choose between the risk of personal harm or doing a thing that violates their consciences, almost all people will, by nature, choose to save their own skin.

Courage is not a virtue that exists in hyperabundance. Nor is it, ironically, one that is particularly durable. Courage needs to be inculcated and affirmed and reaffirmed and nurtured. It is, indeed, a virtue but it is one that can be abandoned for the vice of cowardice. And lest we think that cowardice is anything less than vicious, we need only look at places like 1790s France or 1930s Germany or Russia or 1980s Columbia or contemporary Russia to understand that most people really just want to survive and they will do almost anything to so do.

The best way to get a Police-State or a Narco-State or a Kleptocracy is by having a populace full of cowards. A body-politic full of people who love safety (or at least the trappings thereof…or if not that then having the ability to delude oneself into thinking one can make oneself more secure by denouncing someone, or choosing plata over plomo) more than they love their own honor or justice or morality is a surefire way of getting a nightmare of a nation.

Secularism’s danger isn’t that it has made us a nation which scoffs at the holy and derides the good and dwells in the dank caves of intellectual incoherence. The danger of Secularism isn’t that in professing its wisdom it has become foolish. Secularism’s danger isn’t how it’s infiltrated the church and manipulated the American Christian worldview such that we view things not through the lens of the revealed Word of God and the inner witness of the Spirit, but with eyes wide shut, imagining the great Babel towers being erected in honor of Science. All those things are dangers, and they are dangers with eternal consequences that are, actually, just as, if not more important than the danger of which I now speak.

I speak instead of the danger of a nation of cowards who will say or do anything to survive. Such a nation will denounce their neighbors. Such a nation will support thought-police. Such a nation will idly tolerate concentration camps. Such a nation will yell and scream their way through the Two Minutes Hate, desperately trying to convince themselves that they really do hate the traitors who are undermining Big Brother and desperately hoping that nobody notices that they don’t really believe that these folk really are undermining Big Brother.

It’s not the torturer who scares me – though I don’t think I’d flourish in a prison environment – but the Public Health functionary, the City Clerk cipher, the Average Joe father of three with a boat and 2 dogs who scares me. Because these are the people who aren’t sociopaths, who aren’t misanthropes, who aren’t ideologues – but they most certainly can be made into torturers and with the right pressure these people will one day denounce the Limiters and the next day denounce the Wreckers without a second thought about the incoherence of such a position. People like this are why Stalin and Saddam Hussein get insanely long standing-ovations – who would want the be the first to stop clapping…the first to sit down.

 Proverbs 21:8 says that “The wicked flee, thou no one pursues, but the righteous are as bold as a lion.”

This is one of the more important obscure passages of the Bible because it illustrates a point which is vitally important – not only are true-believers often the most loyal, but it matters very much in what you are a true believer. Yes there are Muslim martyrs. But Islam permits Taqiya. It’s OK to lie about being a Muslim if it will save your life and allow you to continue serving Allah and Islam and forwarding and continuing Jihad. Don’t die as a Shahid unless you can take a lot more infidels with you! But Jesus is SOOOOOOO nit-picky on this point. It’s rather tiresome that Jesus DOESN’T give His followers carte blanche to lie and deny Him before men. Jesus, being the prude He is, demands people live lives of integrity and they be open and honest about their beliefs and loyalties always and everywhere – as though we were to be like Him…

 Moreover, real faith in God comes not only with the moral impetus and the Dominical commands to not be cowards, as well as the warnings of eternal damnation for cowards, but Jesus promises Divine Aid and Intervention for the true believer. The Holy Spirit will speak for the Christian on trial – in fact, Christians are told NOT to plan out their defenses, but to rely on the Holy Spirit who will speak. It would be counterproductive, Jesus says, for a Christian on trial for her faith to plan out what she should say – she should, instead, entrust herself to God – as though Christianity were an act of faith in the Person of Jesus Christ.

And, naturally, this courage doesn’t only come at times of direct and unequivocal persecution, but in times of common evil. The leonine audacity Solomon speaks of is not only pertinent in persecution but in all times where integrity is integral. What American politics needs, more than anything, in the coming years, is not visionary leaders, but people with the courage to act with integrity and not be swept along with the tides of radicalism and authoritarian religious atheism (Wokeism).

Our choices are to choose courage and witness our people reaffirm and correct the ills of society. Or we can choose cowardice and witness with disillusion the dissolution and dissolution that are plaguing our Union and its young people, in particular.

Let me be clear. Sin never makes anyone braver. Yielding to temptation makes us weaker at every step. I’ve lived life giving in to temptation – its fruit is bitter. Only righteousness can make us braver. And boy do we need bravery. But I fear that unless there is a revival in this country, we can say, Bon Voyage Courage.

King Midas and Epstein

Everyone knows the story of King Midas. Though there are many versions, one of the older and more well known states that Midas had rescued Dionysus from his enemies. And as a reward for delivering the god – Dionysus gave Midas a gift. The gift was, as we know, that whatever Midas touched (or came close to) would be turned into gold.

This was, of course, a wonderful gift. And Midas praised Dionysus for this tremendous power to make gold.

Except.

Except these ancient stories always have an “except”. The “except” in Midas’ story is that Midas has no control over what he turns into gold. And this, as you can imagine, is problematic. Obviously this is going to cause problems with eating, dressing, bathing, et cetera. In the classical version, it ends there – with Midas learning the folly of his ways, bathing in the river and no longer having aurifactoral power. Interestingly, the modern version is much darker. In the modern version his daughter comes too close – he touches her and she is transformed into gold!

The point of the story is simple: be careful what you wish for! Or…is it…too much of a good thing is a bad thing…or is it to not seek power you cannot control…or is it a rebuke of greed?

Well, like all good stories, I think it’s probably a combination of all these things. But I think that the modern version has a particularly poignant and pertinent message: the commodification of everything eventually leads to the commodification of people.

Remember, Hawthorne wrote the modern version (and it is VERY worth the read – as all of his short stories are) in the 1850s, when the Industrial Revolution was changing life everywhere and slavery was a major issue, and Abolitionism was reaching its zenith in New England. Children were not scholars and gamers in those days. Oh no, in the 1800s children worked – sometimes very large percentages of children staffed factories and mills. And it’s in that milieu that we need to read Hawthorne.

His Midas is a doting father, who is enraptured with the power to turn everything into gold. Indeed, he states that he wants to make collect vast amounts of wealth to provide security for his daughter! But little does Midas know that the Golden Touch is not only a maker of wealth but a destroyer of beauty and nature. His daughter’s beloved roses are studiously alchemized. Much to Midas’ astonishment – Marigold doesn’t rejoice at the eternal and golden flowers but weeps because they have no perfume.

YES. The golden roses will last forever, but they hurt her when she tries to feel the softness of the petals and the fragrance is no more – they are dead. Midas wanted to collect wealth for his girl – but she’s far more interested in appreciating beauty than in being rich.

This cannot but be seen as a stinging rebuke to the culture of the day! The New Englanders with their puritan work ethic, thought that everything should be made efficient and never should a moment of life be wasted – but what Hawthorne saw was that their “stewardship” was often a stalking horse for greed and covetousness. But more than that – he saw that when everything can be commodified, everything will be. Including people. Including children. Including beloved daughters.

Moreover, I don’t think it’s accidental that it was a daughter. The treatment of little girls in classical literature is always a referendum on character. Why? Because little girls are the most vulnerable to exploitation. Hawthorne is warning – and a warning that we need to heed – that when everything becomes about wealth, people become commodities.

In America we commodify sex. Prostitution, pornography, lewd movies, music, and television, advertisements and commercials are all trying to cash in on sex. And one of the eminently predictable and yet unforeseen consequences of the commodification of sex is the objectification of women and the grooming of little girls. If women are objects, then girls are simply objects-in-training or objects-in-waiting.

Except when they aren’t. Except when little girls are just objects and not potential candidates for objectification. Except when girls are not seen as Divine Image-Bearers, but as means to sexual conquest and financial gain.

In America today there is a powerful move to end the sexual exploitation of children. I fully and completely support this. But I wonder if we’re hacking at leaves and branches and not getting to the root. In fact, I think that’s exactly what we’re doing.

What Hawthorne saw, and we don’t, is that America’s religion is Consumerism. And when Consumerism is your god, then Commodification is your creed and sacrament and sacrifice. Everything must be made salable. And everyone. As long as we worship consumption and wealth, there will be no end of people who seek to profit off by fleshmongery. We will not stop people selling children until we, as a society, decide that somethings aren’t for sale – and that building our worldview on the accrual of wealth and the consumption of goods is not only inexpedient, but it’s destructive, and damning.

Sex-trafficking happens because, as a society, we come to see all things as products for our enjoyment. Until we stop putting dollar signs on everything we won’t stop putting dollar signs on people. And until we stop putting dollar signs on people then the Epsteins of the world will not be black sheep, but bellwethers.

Liar, Liar, Operation Crossfire...Hurricane

OK, so, Whatever you think about President Trump – and a lot of people think and feel a lot of things about him; even some of my most liberal friends have expressed serious concern about the behavior of the FBI and the Department of Justice. Senator Ron Johnson wrote an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal, in which he lays out the case for the FBI and others to release all documents pertaining to Crossfire Hurricane.

Now, I’ve talked before about this issue. Back in April we (on my radio show) talked about the Senate request for the FBI to turn over all documents pertaining to Operation Crossfire Hurricane. They’ve not been. And I, and many others, are extremely concerned that they haven’t been.

What concerns me is that we’ve had a multi-year, multi-million dollar special prosecution against President Trump and his teams. We’ve had oceans of ink spilt and skies of hot air blustered concerning President Trump and Russia, with the presumption and presupposition of guilt. And not only was there no evidence of guilt, but now we know that these investigations were either carried out under the most extreme and tragic form of incompetence – an incompetence that strains, if not defies, credulity – or they were carried out in bad faith. We had all this investigative work, all this public airing of dirty laundry all these “revelations” but the FBI doesn’t want to release its internal documents? That dog won’t hunt – something’s rotten in the state of Denmark! And it is in the interest of all Americans who value actual justice to see these documents released.

Now, back in April I spoke about accountability – that the Bible teaches us plainly that when there are unaccountable people in leadership it ends badly for everyone. Today, however, I don’t want to focus on accountability. Not because it isn’t a major issue! But because there is a simpler story here. One that is missed.

The story we miss, we miss because our standards of morality and decency and righteousness are so anemic in this country that clearly wrong and evil things seem to just breeze past us. I’m talking, of course, about lying.

We just take lying as a matter of course. We just ASSUME that it’s part of the political process. We just ASSUME that politicians are going to lie. And we shouldn’t assume that! It shouldn’t be par for the course. And I don’t care who does it. The other night during the debate Kamala Harris told deliberate lies. And, she should be called out on it an her feet should be held to the fire.

And when President Trump lies – he should be called out and his feet should be held to the fire. But nobody cares anymore. As long as the person lying is on your side, then it’s all good right? MSNBC and CNN and the Print-Media, they all get up in arms about Trump’s lies. And they should! I don’t want my President to lie. Lying is evil. But people stop paying attention when you only point out the lies of your political opponents. The performative outrage is tiresome and its only effective on those who already agree or those who are too lazy or stupid to investigate further than the surface. And that goes for the Spin Doctors on Fox News and the New Media Right, as well.

I don’t want to hear justifications for lies. Lies are bad. Lying is bad. Liars are bad.

And what’s worst of it all is that liars are untrustworthy! I get tired of hearing myself tell my children this, but I constantly have to tell them that nobody can trust a liar. I constantly tell them to not let their integrity and honor be less valuable than a spanking. Now, I know that ideas like integrity and honor and the kind of handshake word-is-my-bond mentality are thought of as quaint and a bit old fashioned and just not capable of making it in this modern world. Our culture seems to find honesty to be the indicator of the naive and the rubes.

Well, I say to Hell with that. Literally, I mean the idea that you have to lie to be a modern man or woman is an idea that needs to go back to the pit of Hell where it belongs. Because, it’s not really enough to talk about the FBI lying about the sources of information. It’s not enough to talk about Presidents and Senators lying. It’s not a government problem it’s an AMERICA problem!

Recently, the Barna Group published their 11th “American Worldview” survey of professing Christians. And here is the meat of the article speaking about the results.

 “A majority (52%) of evangelicals reject absolute moral truth; 61% do not read the Bible on a daily basis; 75% believe that people are basically good,” the report outlines.

And “[w]hile elevating the essence of man to goodness, they have also radically humanized Jesus Christ — 43% believe He sinned while on earth — and demoted the Holy Spirit to symbolic status (58%).”

Half do not believe sex before marriage is sinful, and 40% think lying is okay if done to protect one’s reputation or advance their personal interests. 34% agreed that abortion is acceptable if it spare the woman financial hardship or emotional discomfort.

Pentecostals and charismatics were likewise concerning, as “[t]wo-thirds (69%) reject absolute moral truth; 54% are unwilling to define human life as sacred, with half claiming the Bible is ambiguous in its teaching about abortion, and 69% say they prefer socialism to capitalism.” Further, the Center notes, “[a] full 45% did not meet the definition of born-again Christians.”

Not surprisingly, mainline Protestants showed the greatest departure from orthodoxy, as 60% of those surveyed held to beliefs that directly conflict with the Bible.

“Their customized belief system revolves around three key values: truth and morality are decided by the individual, not God or the Bible; life has no inherent value or purpose, so individuals should pursue personal happiness or satisfaction; and traditional religious practices are no longer seen as central or essential to their Christian faith,” the Center explains.

Now, if you were able to concentrate through the deafening din of that avalanche of depressing data, you might have noticed there was a curious statistic about lying. About how Evangelical Christians feel about lying. Let’s read it again, because it’s important.

“40% think lying is okay if done to protect one’s reputation or advance their personal interests.”

Why else would you lie? So, as long as you’re not a pathological liar it’s OK to lie? I mean who lies for no reason? Who lies for any other reason but to protect or help themselves! I mean, so lying is OK as long as you’re not…what?...the Joker?! As long as you’re not just trying to see the world burn, lying is OK? But hey, seeing the world burn is the Joker’s goal, so maybe it’s OK for him to lie, cause it advances his personal interests?

Good God in Heaven, what is wrong with people? OK, so 40% of Evangelicals think lying is OK. Well, let me give you some Bible. Let me give you what GOD SAYS!

Proverbs 12:22

12:22 The LORD abhors a person who lies, but those who deal truthfully are his delight.

Ephesians 4: 17- 32:

4:17 So I say this, and insist in the Lord, that you no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. 4:18 They are darkened in their understanding, being alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardness of their hearts. 4:19 Because they are callous, they have given themselves over to indecency for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness. 4:20 But you did not learn about Christ like this, 4:21 if indeed you heard about him and were taught in him, just as the truth is in Jesus. 4:22 You were taught with reference to your former way of life to lay aside the old man who is being corrupted in accordance with deceitful desires, 4:23 to be renewed in the spirit of your mind, 4:24 and to put on the new man who has been created in God’s image—in righteousness and holiness that comes from truth.

4:25 Therefore, having laid aside falsehood, each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members of one another. 4:26 Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on the cause of your anger. 4:27 Do not give the devil an opportunity. 4:28 The one who steals must steal no longer; rather he must labor, doing good with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with the one who has need. 4:29 You must let no unwholesome word come out of your mouth, but only what is beneficial for the building up of the one in need, that it may give grace to those who hear. 4:30 And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. 4:31 You must put away every kind of bitterness, anger, wrath, quarreling, and evil, slanderous talk. 4:32 Instead, be kind to one another, compassionate, forgiving one another, just as God in Christ also forgave you.

Or how’s about Revelation 22:14,5:

22:14 Blessed are those who wash their robes so they can have access to the tree of life and can enter into the city by the gates. 22:15 Outside are the dogs and the sorcerers and the sexually immoral, and the murderers, and the idolaters and everyone who loves and practices falsehood!

You wanna know why our politicians are a bunch of self-serving, godless, clowns? You wanna know why our Republic is collapsing in on itself? You wanna know why our culture is disintegrating? You wanna know why our churches are emptying and dying and nobody wants to come?

Because half the Christians in this country are totally OK with lying! Half the Christians in this country love something God hates. Frankly, I don’t think persecution can come fast enough – ‘cause I think that’s the only hope for the Church in America. We need some extremely stern discipline. I just pray it isn’t too late. Please, brothers and sisters, let’s pray that it isn’t too late, and that there can be revival in our selves and in our churches, even if it requires persecution! Because from where I sit it looks like our lampstand is about to be snuffed out. Let’s pray for revival and let’s live a revived life!

I saw Goody Zacharias with the Devil

Scandal! What a word. If you haven’t heard there has been (yes, I know, how can one keep track) there has been another scandal. This time the scandalizer is, purportedly, the deceased Apologist Ravi Zacharias. Ravi is, I must say, a hero to me and to multitudes who found his kind, winsome, wise, and powerful defense of the claims of Christ to be an inspiration. Ravi is the kind of man with the kind of ministry that people do, and should, emulate.

But is there a dark side? Was there, lurking in the shallows of his soul, a vicious abuser of women just waiting to pounce on a likely victim? Was this ostensibly righteous man who advocated Christian morality really, underneath it all, a depraved pervert? Could this paragon of the faith really have been a gutter-dweller the likes of which Epstien would find commendable?

I mean…maybe, but prolly not, right.

Of course, all of us are sinners and none of us has been Sanctified. So we know, or at least all wise Christians know, that all of us are subject to falling and failure. Men are frail – the Spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. We know this. So, it is not beyond the realm of possibility that Ravi may be a dissipated pervert who got off on getting himself off.

But the question is: is it likely? You see, anyone can make any accusation against anyone. Now, you run the risk of a defamation suit if you aren’t careful. But, it’s pretty safe to lodge and accusation in this country. Especially for a woman to lodge a complaint against a man in the incoherent #metoo era where we talk about violence against women, but can’t define what a woman is. But just because someone is accused doesn’t mean they’re guilty. In fact, just because there is an accusation doesn’t mean it’s a reliable accusation. Trustworthiness matters. Likelihood matters. And with the information we have in front of us now, I would say that it strains credulity to believe that Ravi did the things he’s accused of. Is it possible? Sure. Is it likely? No. Should there be a mass investigation by every church or parachurch organization that had any affiliation with Ravi? I mean, if they want, but I, personally, find this whole accusation thing a bit untoward.

If these acts really happened, why did no one go to…I don’t know…the police? Or RZIM? Or…Ravi’s business partner? Or…like, literally anyone who could have done anything, whatsoever? If they didn’t, why not? If they did and those organizations chose to take no action, why not? I think there are a lot of unanswered questions that need to be considered before we A) say a full scale investigation is worth our time and effort B) have any reasonable expectations that an investigation would prove anything C) begin to launch outrageous slings and arrows at man who served Christ in the most public of ways for decades without ever having a credible accusation against him.

But that’s not the age we live in. And that’s frightening. It’s frightening that an accusation is tantamount to guilt in our society. It’s frightening that there are people saying “believe all women” and “believe the victim”. Believe ALL women? Every one? And why say “believe the victim”? Everyone wants to believe the victim, but saying: “believe the victim” presupposes their allegation is true. So, we’re what to always believe all women, and especially to believe them when their accusing someone of a very disgusting and heinous crime? Just…believe them…no evidence needed…just like that, ey? I think that that’s kinda hard to do, because sometimes…I know, this is a shock and may hurt some people’s feelings to hear…well, here goes, I’m gonna say it anyways – women lie. There, I said it, women lie. Also, so do men. Also, again, this may come as a shock – men and women are both humans. We’re both susceptible to the same frailties. If men lie, and they do, so do women. But that’s not the direction our culture is moving. We’re just supposed to believe all women.

But, what, exactly, about being a woman makes you eminently believable. Are women inherently more honest than men? more virtuous? better? are women just plain ol’ better than men? And how does this work with people suffering from gender dysphoria? If a man identifies as a woman does that mean that we should believe him? Do we believe all women, even if they have penes and beards? What if a woman identifies as a man, do we believe her? Does she immediately become a member of the Patriarchy once she identifies as a man? What about the man who identifies as a woman? Is he STILL a member of the Patriarchy? This is all so confusing. I don’t know whom to default believe without seeing evidence? I don’t know who has a default benefit in all matters moral and legal! Argh.

And, as psychotic as that all sounds (and it sounds that way…’cause it is) there are other and more important issues at stake! Here’s the bigger point – whenever a culture gets to the point that an accusation is sufficient to ruin someone’s life without, ya know, due process, a trial, the opportunity to confront your accusers, ya know, the whole jury of peers, beyond a reasonable doubt, stuff maybe, I know it’s crazy, and probably it’s just my White, Male, Heterosexual, Cisgender, Christian, Patriarchal, Bourgeois Middle Class Privilege speaking for me to demand evidence to be presented. But it seems clear from history that whenever a culture gets to the point where the accused are automatically guilty, justice is no longer justice. It’s now a Witchhunt. And we all know how Witchhunts go! Sure, it’s fun in the beginning because the whole society can come together and ostracize the weirdos that nobody liked anyways; and getting rid of deplorables and undesirables, while simultaneously feeling virtuous, is a big score for any society. Yuge. But after you grab the low hanging fruit of the smelly kids, now’s when Witchhunts aren’t so fun. Because once that snowball gets a rolling it will crush everything in its path. So everyone who doesn’t wanna become a permanent alpine decoration makes sure to get out of the way by overdoing their commitment to the cause. People outdo eachother in their efforts to be orthodox, or good Jacobins, or good Communists, or Good Americans, or truly Woke.

And, sadly but truly, Witchhunts are a crisis not to let go to waste because a Witchhunt is a great time to steal other people’s expensive stuff. There’re just a few simple steps.

1) Identify someone whose stuff you want to steal.

2) Denounce that someone whose stuff you want to steal.

3) Steal their stuff.

It’s really just that easy – but wait, there’s more. You can also make a denunciation to get yourself off the hook. Nothing establishes your Witchhunting bona fides like denouncing your friends and family!

Now, we’re not barbarians, you can’t just go to their house and take their stuff after the denounced are [imprisoned, hanged, guillotined, drowned, burned, sent to the gulags, blacklisted, cancelled]. No, no, no, we’re not savages. You can’t just go ghoulishly rifling through dead neighbors’ property! Quel dommage! We civilized folk sue them in civil court for “damages”. Yeah, that’s the ticket. There’s a word just concrete enough to get to people’s feels but abstract enough to be vague.

I mean, if Goody Proctor stole your man, you just tell everyone you saw Goody Proctor with the Devil. Easy Peasy Slanderous Murder-by-Proxy.

Now, eventually, these things burn themselves out. PUN! Get it? Burn…themselves…burn…witches…yeah, you get it…no, don’t shake your head…you know you laughed. Anyways, these things burn themselves out because eventually people either A) catch on or B) the wrong person is denounced. Because the thing is, these things only work as long as society, at large, permits them to. I mean a good ole witch-burning is cathartic, so it plays to the low-brows. The high-brows know this and let a certain amount of it go on. You know, the whole panem et circenses philosophy. But once it ceases to be to their advantage to have people denouncing and burning and drowning and beheading, they clamp down – or at least they try to…ask Max Robespierre about the importance of timing and crowd-control. Letting hoi polloi hunt witches is a great way to let society blow off some steam, purge enemies, and distract from institutional failures. You just, ya know, you just gots to get that timin’ right.

But, sooner or later, people, even the little people, they catch on. They realize that all Wokeness is performative Wokeness. They realize that people aren’t playing the game in good faith and then they get worried. And that’s normally about the time it quits.

I don’t like the direction our culture is going. I don’t like Witchhunts. The only people who do are people who prefer power over justice and vengeance over righteousness. Witchhunts are the tool of the petty and incompetent and pompous and the manipulative. But it’s no way to govern a society. And its no tool to correct the errors of culture.

We need to stop playing this game. I know; I know it’s fun to level-up your status by dogpiling on the accused. I know it’s intoxicating to have the instant validation of victimization. I know that it’s cathartic to try to destroy those we don’t like and with whom we disagree. But this game ends badly. It ends badly because it’s a bad game. And if you play it – you’re bad.