God, the Gospel, and the Gay Challenge

Evangelical Christians in the United States now face an inevitable moment of decision. While Christians in other movements and in other nations face similar questions, the question of homosexuality now presents evangelicals in the United States with a decision that cannot be avoided. Within a very short time, we will know where everyone stands on this question. There will be no place to hide, and there will be no way to remain silent. To be silent will answer the question.

The question is whether evangelicals will remain true to the teachings of Scripture and the unbroken teaching of the Christian church for over two thousand years on the morality of same-sex acts and the institution of marriage.

The world is pressing this question upon us, but so are a number of voices from within the larger evangelical circle — voices that are calling for a radical revision of the church’s understanding of the Bible, sexual morality, and the meaning of marriage. We are living in the midst of a massive revolution in morality, and sexual morality is at the center of this revolution. But the question of same-sex relationships and sexuality is at the very center of the debate over sexual morality, and our answer to this question will both determine or reveal what we understand about everything the Bible reveals and everything the church teaches — even the gospel itself.   Continue at Al Mohler

A Reformed Critique of Alcoholics Anonymous

This article was first written in 1987. It was first published in the Reformed Herald in 1989. It appears here with only minor revisions.

Since I first posted this essay on the web in 1999, it has generated more response than I expected. Before you write to complain that I have misrepresented AA or to tell me how much AA has helped you or to give me sources to read on the history of AA, please note that this is not my current field of research nor will it be any time soon. Please note that this essay is not intended as a personal criticism nor does it intend to deny that God is free to work as he wills. I understand that some have been helped by AA. That fact, however, does not change the will of God revealed in Holy Scripture (Deut 29:29). That God has used AA to bring one to faith in Jesus is a cause for thanks but it is not a reason to withhold criticism of AA. This essay is intended primarily to encourage confessional Reformed and Presbyterian churches to take up their responsibility to love sinners. Revised February, 2006.   Continue at Scott Clark

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“His Everlasting Arms Can Bear us Up”

“God is a great God, who taketh the care and charge upon Him of the sustentation and government of all things to their proper ends and uses. How soon would the world fall into confusion and nothing without His power and care!

Now this should recommend Him to our esteem and love. Oh, what a blessed thing is it to have an interest in this powerful and almighty God! All His strength and power is engaged for the meanest and weakest of His children.

1 Peter 1:5, ‘We are kept by the power of God to salvation;’ and therefore we are bidden to be ‘strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might.’ Surely they are blessed that have such a mighty God on their side, and engaged with them against their enemies.   Continue at Tolle Lege

God’s Commitment to Forgetfulness

For I will be merciful to their wrongdoing, and I will never again remember their sins. (Hebrews 8:12)

It is I who sweep away your transgressions for My own sake and remember your sins no more. (Isaiah 43:25)

Last Wednesday, my daily devotional reading was near the end of the book of Judges, where Samson met his fateful end after a life of disordered love and disobedience. As I closed my Bible that morning, I recalled how the sad epitaph on Samson’s life in Judges (“he killed more in his death than he did in his life”) is not repeated in the New Testament. The author of Hebrews lists Samson as a man of faith. Period. How kind of the Lord, I thought, to put Samson’s flawed legacy in the background and simply list him as a hero, one who “gained strength after being weak.”

Later that day, Johnny Hunt spoke at LifeWay’s chapel and delivered a truth-filled message about how God’s grace overcomes past regrets. He brought up God’s promise to “forget” our sins, to never bring up our past again, and he pointed to the New Testament’s discussion of Old Testament heroes as proof.

Think about it. No matter how flawed our heroes are shown to be in the Old Testament, they are presented at their best in the New.  Continue at  Trevin Wax

Answering Evil

Dr. John Gerstner, my esteemed mentor, certainly had a way of getting my attention and helping me to think more clearly. I still remember when I told him that I thought the problem of evil is irresolvable. Having noted that the best apologists and theologians in church history haven’t answered all the questions raised by the existence of evil in this world, I told him that no one would ever solve the problem on this side of eternity. He turned and rebuked me. “How do you know the problem of evil will never be solved?” he asked. “Perhaps you or another thinker are the one God has appointed to solve this issue.”

With all due respect to Dr. Gerstner, I think he overestimated his students. I haven’t changed my opinion on the problem of evil since that conversation. In the many years I’ve taught philosophy, apologetics, and theology, and in the many conversations I’ve had with hurting people, a full answer to the problem of evil remains elusive. If anything, recent events make the problem seem more acute. In the past year alone, we’ve dealt with terrorists bombing the Boston Marathon as well as the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Connecticut. Hurricane Sandy killed nearly 300 people in the Northeastern United States. We could also mention the hundreds of thousands who died in tsunamis in 2004 and 2011. The list is almost endless.   Continue at R. C. Sproul

Columns from Tabletalk Magazine, July 2013

The July edition of Tabletalk is out. This edition examines the right use of the tongue in our relationship to God and neighbor. Our God speaks, and when He created man in His image, He gave man the gift of speech in order that we might have communion with Him. Mankind has misused this gift, however. Rather than praising God, we take His name in vain. Rather than building our neighbor up, we flatter and gossip and slander. Christians are called to love the Lord our God with all of our heart and mind, and to love our neighbor as ourselves. One way that we practice such love is through our words. Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.

Contributors include R.C. Sproul along with Andrew Peterson, Derek Thomas, Jeffrey Jue, Iain Campbell, Jared Wilson, Timothy Paul Jones, John Sartelle, Dane Ortlund, Scott Sauls, R.C. Sproul Jr., Chan Kilgore, Richard Gamble, Mary Kassian and Michael Beates.  Continue at Ligonier

God Does Not Owe Us a Happy Ending

It is a visual age. Cameras are ubiquitous, software is cheap, computers are powerful, and together they give us a video for every occasion. We, as Christians, have a video for every occasion. I love to watch the ones that tell the story of a husband and wife who had been on the verge of divorce but rekindled the flame, the ones about the godly wife who was willing to reconcile with her adulterous husband, the ones telling about the couple who endured the difficulty of a long and complicated adoption but were able to return home triumphant, holding that precious child in their arms, the ones about the dear, elderly man who found joy and contentment in caring for the wife who could no longer recognize or acknowledge him.

These videos provide a glimpse of God’s grace in the lives of his people and they are inspiring in the best sense. They give us hope that if we were to find ourselves in those situations, we would experience the Father’s kindness and blessing.

And yet, not every story has a happy ending. This world is so broken, so marked by sin, that many of our stories do not end with a kiss, they do not end with fulfillment, they do not end with a clear purpose. I love these videos just as you do, but they tell only select stories, not every story.   Continue at Tim Challies

God Rules the Mundane

There was no way the crusted blueberry bits were going to come off this cup without some serious work on my part. I started talking to myself aloud. (Do you do this too?) "I don't have time for this," I mumbled. I gritted my teeth and set to scrubbing with vigor, and when my husband, Dave, passed by the kitchen I let out an exasperated sigh and exaggerated my scrubbing efforts. "Gee, I hope I can get this cup clean. You didn't rinse it out."

Dave apologized and said he had simply forgotten.

How rude, I thought. He knows how much work I do. The least he could have done was rinse out the cup. Rude . . . But really, I was the rude one, and I knew it. The Holy Spirit brought to mind the famous love passage in 1 Corinthians 13:

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. (1 Cor. 13:4-8)

The New International Version translates verse 8 as "love never fails."   Continue at Gloria Furman

Why Christians Are Sometimes Annoying

For the same reason that atheists are, we talk about God too much.  

For some cockamamie reason, I don’t have a “Housewife Theologian” Facebook page. I know it’s not the smartest (non)move, but it fits in the same category for why I never joined a sorority—I don’t feel the need to ask people to like me. But I do share a link to my recent articles on my personal page. I have plenty of friends who aren’t Christians, as well as those who just don’t care to see yet another post talking about God every other day. Since I care too much about what other people think, I worry that I am annoying my Facebook “friendies” by dropping yet another post about God in their news feed.

Some Christians really are annoying about it. Every other word out of their mouth is “the good Lord” this and “God bless” that. After a couple of minutes you realize that they may have a colorful God veneer, but all that’s underneath is particle board. That’s a real shame.

And yet, we really should be obsessed with God. The preacher to the Hebrews says so. The first chapter division introduces the sermon with the supremacy of Christ. In just the first three verses we learn that he is the ultimate prophet, heir of all things, and the radiance of God’s glory. To take it up a notch, the sermon continues to explain that Christ isn’t only better than the prophets, but he is also better than the angels. If angels delivered a message to us, we would think it to be pretty important. What does our final messenger indicate about the value of the message?   Continue at Aimee Byrd

Whatever Happened To God?

In any discussion of reformation in doctrine one must come to the realization that the real problem of our time is that there is hardly any doctrine at all to reform. So when we talk about reformation we must focus on a recovery of theology, period. Certainly in the liberal churches there is a lack of exposition of Scripture and sound doctrine, and unfortunately, this is rapidly becoming the case in evangelical circles as well.

Now you might ask which doctrines are missing? I argue that primarily what we need is a recovery of the doctrine of God. You have to have some kind of starting point and that's the point where I think we should begin. People have lost any real sense of the fact that when we come to church we come to worship and learn about God. Years ago I spoke at a conference and my topic was on a number of the attributes of God. Later I got some feedback from a gentleman who was listening to my presentation. He had been in the church for thirty years, and in fact was now an elder, and that was the first time that he ever heard a series of messages on the attributes of God. And after hearing this, his friend asked him, "Well, whom did you think you were worshiping all that time?" But he hadn't really thought about those things and I'm convinced that we have literally thousands of people in our churches today who really seldom, if ever, think about who it is they are worshiping, if they think about God at all.

Now, I think there are some reasons for this. One reason is the terrible impact of television on our culture which has produced a virtually mindless age. Television is not a medium which shares information well, it is primarily an entertainment medium. It puts pictures on the screen onto which people project their own aspirations and desires, and because it works so powerfully and is so pervasive it has the tendency to transform anything it touches into entertainment, and it does it very quickly. One of the most significant books I've read in the last few years in terms of what is actually happening to the mind is Neil Postman's, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show-Business. It's not that entertainment itself is bad. But television is most damaging when it tries to be serious. So when you put news on TV, you get brief little soundbites encased in slick images, and this is not really information, it is entertainment.    Continue at James Montgomery Boice

Raising Our Children . . . Without God?

We live in a culture that is shaking its fist in rebellion against God. More and more, people in our society are choosing to abandon the Bible as the ultimate authority and embrace the self-centered, godless philosophies that the Apostle Paul warns about in Colossians 2:8:

Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ.

One of these deceitful philosophies is atheism. And in today’s culture, the atheistic worldview is being pushed not only to adults, but also to our children. At Answers in Genesis, we chose the theme for the next two years “Standing Our Ground, Rescuing Our Kids.” Why? Because secularists know that if they can win the hearts and minds of just one generation, they will win the culture.

In a recent article titled “Why I Raise My Children Without God,” the guest writer (who remains anonymous), a mother of two teenagers, explains why she no longer tells her children about God. She lists a series of objections to believing in God and attempts to defend them, and she directly states the intent of secularists to capture the coming generation: “We are creating the next generation of kids, and there is a wave of young agnostics, atheists, free thinkers and humanists rising up.” Sadly, the point of her article is to share her atheistic views and how they have affected her parenting, in the hope of influencing others in a similar way.  Continue at Steve Golden

Is “Allah” the Same God as “Yahweh”?

Dr. R. C. Sproul answers this question in an article entitled “A Rose is a Rose.” He writes:

 

A rose is a rose is a rose. This dictum reinforces the adage that a rose by any other name is still a rose. The idea is that the essence of the rose is not conditioned by what name is attached to it. It is its res, not its nomina, that determines what it is. In different languages, the same flower is known by different names, but it is still the same flower.

When we apply this idea to theology things get a bit more complicated. Indeed the rose adage has been transferred indiscriminately to religion in order to create a theological concept. The concept is: “God by any other name is still God.” Now certainly, it is true that the immutable essence of God is not changed by the alteration of His name. In English, we may say “God,” in German “Gott,” in Greek “Theos,” yet all these names or words are used to point to the same Deity.

Beyond this, however, things get murky. It is a quantum leap to go from saying that God by any other name is still God, to saying that all the great religions in the world believe in the same Being though they call Him different names.

This irrational leap is prodded by the popular analogy of the mountain. This analogy notes that their are many roads up the mountain. Some progress on a more direct route, while others wind about on more circuitous roads, but sooner or later they all arrive at the same place, at the top of the mountain.   Continue at John Samson

Killing Sprees—Is There a Common Theological Thread?

But that fact goes to my point that one’s beliefs about ultimate truth really do guide one’s behavior. And there seems to be a common theological thread among killing spree killers. They’re not worried about God, judgment, or a place called hell.

On Christmas Eve William Spengler set fire to his house. When firemen responded to the call, he ambushed them; killing two and wounding two others. That was the third time this month (December, ’12) that someone has gone on a horrific killing spree in America. 

Spengler committed suicide; which is what Adam Lanza did after he killed 26 in Newtown on Dec 14. On Dec 12 in an Oregon mall, Jacob Tyler Roberts killed two and then took his own life. Back in 1999, the Columbine killers, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, also killed themselves. Thinking about this, I began to wonder how many “killing spree” killers ended their rampage in a similar manner. I was surprised at what I found.

A Wikipedia article provides a lists of what it calls “rampage killers”—those who have committed mass murder at schools, work, and other various places. Of those who perpetrate school massacres, the article gives a list of 15 murderers (a link to a longer list is available there). It turns out that of those 15, 13 committed suicide (one was killed by police). Only one out of the 15 allowed himself to be taken alive.   Continue at Ken Keathley

Where Was God in All the Goodness of 2012?

As this year ends, the question I am asking is: Where was God when so many good things happened this past year? 

How can God be a God of justice, yet allow so much good to happen to people who dishonor him by disbelieving in him, or giving lip service to his existence, or paying no more attention to him than the carpet in their den, or rejecting the kingship of his Son, or scorning his word, or preferring a hundred pleasures before him?

How can God be righteous and do so much good to us who are so unrighteous? 

Where was God in 2012?

• Where was God when nine million planes landed safely in the United States?
• Where was God when the world revolved around the sun so accurately that it achieved the Winter solstice perfectly at 5:12 AM December 21 and headed back toward Spring?
• Where was God when the President was not shot at a thousand public appearances?
• Where was God when American farms produced ten million bushels of corn, and 2.8 million bushels of soybeans — enough food to sell $100 billions worth to other nations?
• Where was God when no terrorist plot brought down a single American building or plane or industry?    Continue at Desiring God

God Is the Lord of History

I never cease to be amazed at how many surprises remain in familiar passages of Scripture, if we stare long enough. I hope I have come to the point of entirely distrusting any presumption that I have exhausted any portion of God’s Word. This has particularly been the recurring lesson from the Gospel of Luke, as I have been teaching it to the college-group in our congregation. Though familiar territory, the announcements and births of both John the Baptist and the Lord Jesus (Luke 1-2) are filled with many sanctifying surprises.

For example, when we reflect on Jesus’ birth in Luke 2:1-21, we garner much comfort in how God sovereignly rules over all human government to accomplish His purposes in Christ. Perhaps this a tad relevant to our present day?

Why Was Jesus Born in Bethlehem?

Of course, Micah prophesied the birth of our Lord Jesus over 6 centuries before it was fulfilled (Micah 5:2). The Son of David, whose throne God would establish forever (2 Sam 7:13; cf. Luke 1:32-33), was to be born in David’s hometown (cf. 1 Sam 16:1-4). If He actually is the Messiah of David’s line, then Jesus had to be born in Bethlehem and fulfill God’s very old promises. But that’s not the only reason Jesus was born in Bethlehem.  Continue at Steve Meister

Why Doesn’t God Do More to Restrain Evil and Suffering? Part 2

In order to understand this blog, it would be helpful for you to have read the previous one. 

 

Severe suffering seems unacceptable to us precisely because we are unaccustomed to it.

Susanna Wesley had nineteen children; nine of them died before they reached the age of two. Puritan Cotton Mather had fifteen children and outlived all but two. Ironically, the problem of evil and suffering seems worse to us who live in affluent cultures precisely because we face less of it than many people have throughout history.

I heard an exasperated woman at a restaurant table loudly proclaim that her Porsche had to be taken in for repairs and now she had to drive her Audi. In contrast I have met devout Christians in Africa and Southeast Asia who have endured famine, genocide, and persecution, yet smile genuinely as they affirm God’s goodness and grace.

C. S. Lewis wrote,

Imagine a set of people all living in the same building. Half of them think it is a hotel, the other half think it is a prison. Those who think it is a hotel might regard it as quite intolerable, and those who thought it was a prison might decide that it was really surprisingly comfortable. So that what seems the ugly doctrine is one that comforts and strengthens you in the end. The people who try to hold an optimistic view of this world would become pessimists: the people who hold a pretty stern view of it become optimistic. [1]

People who ask why God allowed their house to burn down likely never thanked God for not letting their house burn down the previous ten thousand days of their lives. Why does God get blame when it burns, but no credit when it doesn’t? Many pastors and church members have experienced church splits, feeling the agony of betrayal and disillusionment. But where were the prayers of gratitude back when the church was unified? Our suffering seems extreme in the present only because God has graciously minimized many of our past sufferings.   Continue at Randy Alcorn

The Biggest Lie About Law?

One of the commonest errors about law relative to Christian conduct is that God no longer uses fear or laws to promote Christian conduct.

I was born and raised in a fundamentalist milieu that was at times excessive in its proliferation of rules and regulations. I recognize quite freely that this tendency, while commencing as a well-intentioned pursuit of godliness, in many instances offered fertile soil for the wickedness of self-aggrandizing Pharisaism, fear-driven authoritariainism, and the diminution of the gospel of the grace of God.

Still, I was uncomfortable when I read recently that “rules and regulations…bring about a kind of religious moralism that is very far from genuine Christianity” and, further, that such rules de facto reflect a sort of fear that is incompatible with faith.

Why was I uncomfortable? Well, because the New Testament is filled with fear-motivated rules and regulations that function as legitimate self-disciplinary tools for the promotion of true Christian godliness. Note the following:

• “Great fear” induced the early church not to lie (Acts 5:5, 11 cf. 19:17ff).
• Paul exhorts us as believers to “purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit, perfecting holiness out of fear for God” (2 Cor 7:1).
• Paul tells slaves to “be obedient to those who are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in the sincerity of your heart, as to Christ” (Eph 6:5).
• Paul tells his readers, “As you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling” (Phil 2:12).   Continue at Mark Snoeberger

The Knowledge of the Holy by A. W. Tozer (Book Notes)

A. W. Tozer's The Knowledge of the Holy is one of the great classic works of Evangelical spirituality from the twentieth century. It is an exploration of the character and attributes of God that is both theologically sound and devotionally rich, weaving together Scripture, hymnody, prayer, and practical application, along with some of the most illuminating quotations of worshipful saints from across the centuries. 

I recently completed reading it again and this time took notes. Here is a selection of some of the most helpful statements, with both chapter and page numbers (though my edition is different from the one linked above). 

You can also get the book for just $ .99 on Kindle. 

What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us. (Ch. 1; p. 7)

An attribute of God is whatever God has in any way revealed as being true of Himself. (Ch. 3; p. 18)

The full sun-blaze of revelation came at the incarnation when the Eternal Word became flesh to dwell among us. (Ch. 3; p. 20)

The doctrine of the Trinity is…truth for the heart. (Ch. 4; p. 29)  Continue at  Brian Hedges

God Ordains Both the Ends and the Means

Dan Phillips, at the Pyromaniacs blog site wrote a short article entitled, “A stick, salt water, salvation — and us.”

“God works through means,” we say. 

And it’s true. In fact, He usually works through means. That is to say, God uses some portion of His creation to affect some other portion of His creation.

This is maybe better understood if we think of the one occasion in which God used no means: the creation of the universe. Unless you wish to press the thought that God used His word (Ps. 33:6), God did not create the universe by means of anything in the universe. One timeless moment; the triune God alone; the next (first!) moment, a word, and bam! — the universe.

Otherwise, He uses means. Adam must feed himself, must build a shelter. Eve must make clothes. Noah has to cut down a lot of trees. And so on.

Now, sometimes the means are plain and proportionate. Right now, I’m tapping keys, and letters are appearing on the screen. No letter appears without a tap; a tap produces a letter. Or a space. Means, simple and straightforward.  Continue at John Samson

The Mocking of Muhammad and Condemning of Christ

Jesus’s uniqueness and beauty is on display if his followers respond with grace when he is reviled.

When adherents of Islam counter the mocking of their central figure with outrage and violence, they provide “another vivid depiction of the difference between Muhammad and Christ, and what it means to follow each,” says John Piper. 

Piper concedes that not all Muslims approve the violence, but notes that a profound lesson still stands: “The work of Muhammad is based on being honored and the work of Christ is based on being insulted. This produces two very different reactions to mockery.”

A Deep Difference Between Jesus and Muhammad

Jesus is unique. And Christians believe there is a divine beauty in the mocking that he willingly subjects himself to by becoming man — because it’s a mocking and reviling and bruising and dying that is for us and for our salvation. Piper continues in his 2006 article, “Being Mocked: The Essence of Christ’s Work, Not Muhammad’s”:

If Christ had not been insulted, there would be no salvation. This was his saving work: to be insulted and die to rescue sinners from the wrath of God. Already in the Psalms the path of mockery was promised: “All who see me mock me; they make mouths at me; they wag their heads” (Psalm 22:7). “He was despised and rejected by men . . . as one from whom men hide their faces . . . and we esteemed him not” (Isaiah 53:3).

When it actually happened it was worse than expected. “They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, and twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on his head. . . . And kneeling before him, they mocked him, saying, ‘Hail, King of the Jews!’ And they spit on him” (Matthew 27:28–30). His response to all this was patient endurance. This was the work he came to do. “Like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth” (Isaiah 53:7).  Continue at David Mathis