Billboard Disgust

I saw a couple billboards this week, both within a few miles of each other in Ohio, that left me feeling very sad and very disgusted. I wish I could have snapped pictures, but alas, I’m just not that quick so I will have to describe them for you.

The first one I saw simply had these words on it:

The True Sabbath is Saturday. The Anti-Christ Changed It

This one is just a sad, poor representation of the church. The true church has never changed the Sabbath. If anything, we do not observe the Sabbath in a “biblical manner.” Correct, the Sabbath was on Saturday. But we do not celebrate the Sabbath necessarily. Instead what we celebrate by worshipping on Sunday is the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Without it, even Sabbath observance would mean nothing to us, for we would be doomed. I could go into more discussion, but I do not want to make this post long.

Here is the second, far more disturbing billboard. On one side there was a depiction of Mary, the mother of Jesus. The words next to it read;

This is My Time

I had to do a double-take to make sure I read it right. I am certain it was referring to the Christmas season given the colors of the billboard and the timing. I am also sure the billboard’s message is grossly wrong. It seems to imply that the Christmas holiday is about Mary, her great faith and experience in bearing the Christ-child. I am confident though, if we were able to ask Mary, her response would be far more focused on Christ. The birth of Jesus is about Him. It is about the fact that the God of the universe miraculously humbled himself and took on the form of a baby. I am sure Mary would not want any of the attention placed on her. It was not “her time” but “His time” that really held any importance.

Sure when we celebrate Christmas we do tend to let it be about gifts, Santa, food, and family gatherings. In this sense we do tend to fail if we do not make it about that baby born in Bethlehem so many years ago. But I am also sure that we would fail if we made it about the mother of that baby born. It is Christ’s Time. Not Mary’s.

What Did God Save You From?

This question was posed on a radio station, and I am curious as to how you would answer. How we answer is a vital look into our understanding of the Gospel.

Consider this; one person called in and answered the question pointing to the type of person they were before they came to Christ, and his answer was that God saved him from those things. Another answer given was that God saved them from some horrendous event in their life. Lastly someone answered stating God saved them from their sin.

All these answers may be true to some degree, but are they really getting at the heart of the question? When we speak of God saving people, we are speaking of salvation, so with that in mind, what does salvation save us from? In reality there is only one answer. God has saved us from… God.

That may seem a bit odd to say, but it is true. Salvation is about dealing with the sin in our lives. Without salvation, we would be justly required to endure the righteous wrath of God for eternity. But God, through His Son, has saved us from His own wrath.

Some might argue that the third answer given by the radio listener was correct, but it is not. God did not save us from sin. Instead, he saved us from the resulting judgment caused by our sin. It is true that one day we will be totally freed from the bondage of sin in this flesh, but that is not the full or proper understanding of salvation.

One final observation. The first two answers I found to be disturbing. If people think this is what the Gospel is about, then we as proclaimers of the Gospel have not presented the message clearly enough, or we have failed to make sure our hearers truly understand the Gospel. We need to be sure to communicate that salvation is not about having a better life, it is about dealing with the sin in our lives. All other aspects of the Gospel are secondary to this most important facet.

Are You a Man?

My final installment on a series of old posts from a previous blog I authored that has been shut down.

I could wait no longer.  Earlier this week I was directed to view a video on YouTube that I found to be both hilarious and sad all rolled into one.  This video is been quickly spreading around the Grace College campus, and so I decided to post some of my thoughts on the video and the beliefs behind it.

The exegesis committed by this pastor is horrendous.  He shows no regard for context and has no interest in how language functions.  He is a King James Only advocate which creates a whole other host of issues, but his arguments from his church's website are poor at best and very anti-intellectual.  I was raised in a KJO church, and at that church the arguments were at least academic in nature, so while I do not agree with the position, I at least respect their attempt at making their argument.  But those who make an argument based on strict opinion and even anti-intellectual beliefs, they earn zero respect.

What saddens me most about this is the fact that this man is standing behind a pulpit, proclaiming what he believes to be the Word of God, and thus leading a church down a treacherous path.  He also, by publishing his sermon videos on YouTube, is potentially creating a negative witness to the Gospel message and what true followers of Christ are about.  It seems he is more concerned about the judgment of God than he is the love of God.  True, even I believe the judgment of God is poorly understood and downplayed far more than it should be, but if it is not preached alongside the love of God, then the Gospel is not preached.  And the purpose of preaching is to proclaim the good news.  (side note, the word translated Gospel in the Greek literally means 'good news' and the verb is 'to proclaim good news').

So here is the video.

Ok, now some critique on it.

 
First - the issue of context.  The pastor is seeking to proclaim that only men who urinate while standing are true men, and this is whom God is seeking.  Therefore, we should also only urinate while standing if we want to be men that God seeks.  But notice that in the context God is seeking these men for one purpose: to destroy them.  The passages he is referring to are I Sam 25:22, 34; I Kings 14:10; 16:11; 21:21; and II Kings 9:8.  In each one of these the phrase is used in the context of those whom God is going to destroy.  Is this message reflected in the pastor's exposition?

Second - the understanding of language.  He attacks the NKJV and NIV translators for not correctly translating the phrase, but instead translates it only as "men."  This is true, and there is nothing wrong with it.  The phrase in Hebrew is simply idiomatic. There may be some emphasis being made by using the idiom, but this does not automatically display inferiority in the newer translations. His other attacks have issues as well, but are outside the scope of this post.  And we don't even have time to get into the issues of textual criticism!

Lastly - poor understanding of canonical development.  He alludes to numerology, particularly pointing out verse referencing.  The problem with this is that the verse numbering system was not in place until well after the cannon was established.  But he uses the verse numbering system to make a theological point.  The verse and chapter divisions are in no way inspired, so on what basis can he make this argument.

There are more, but I can only spend so much time blogging.  I do have a life outside of the internet, and it is a busy one.

Just please, pay attention to II Timothy 2:15!

Moses On Drugs

There was a news article linked from the Drudge Report yesterday titled "Moses was High On Drugs: Israeli Researcher". I recommend you first read it here.

The theological implications of this are huge. If the divine origin of the cultic practice of the Jews is falsified, then the entirety of the Bible is established on false grounds and as Paul would say, we would be the most foolish of them all to believe in such things.

What is wrong with this conclusion?

Shanon notes that he already does not believe in the possibility for the super-natural, so automatically he is going to search for another way of explaining what happened in regards to such events as the burning bush and the giving of the Law. This is a sure-fire example of how presuppositions can govern interpretation.

Another problem is that of the question of what is reasonable. The drugs explanation may be credible for the burning bush account, but to use it to explain the giving of the Law at Sinai is pressing the bounds of what is reasonable. It would require that over a million men, women, and children were all taking this drug. It would also negate the possibility for a naturalistic explanation for the complexity found in the Law. Could someone who is high on these drugs really create such a Law system in its moral/judicial and cultic systems? This stretches the bounds of reason to beyond the breaking point.

Lastly is Shanon's credibility. He said himself that he has taken similar kinds of drugs. Experience in taking them does not make him an expert of what they can do, and makes one question his ability to use proper reason in performing these sorts of studies.