In the “evolution is more creative than we are” department, Carl Zimmer has written an account in terms comprehensible by us non-scientists, of an article published in Cell. He titled it A Dead Dog Lives On (Inside New Dogs). I heartily recommend his article, especially for those who think that the paths taken by evolution are extremely limited. It’s fascinating!
Author: henry
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Connecticut Senate Race: Good Thing
I like following the elections nationwide, and one of the means I use to do it is CQPolitics.com and their e-mail notifications. This morning, I was reading commentary on the Senate race in Connecticut, Conn. Senate Race Still Likely to Have a Democratic Winner. Of course, that prediction is not terribly difficult to make, assuming one grants that Lieberman is still a Democrat.
I have to say, however, that I don’t like the commentary from either of the major parties, which should be no surprise to those who know me, because I rarely make it a secret that I loathe the parties themselves. I’m registered as an independent not because I don’t care to choose between them, but because I can’t stand being identified with either of them.
So I really don’t care what this primary election does to the Democratic plans for the fall, nor what Republicans think they can spin out of it. I must mention that the Republican spin on this thing is unusually ridiculous, and that’s saying something. Lamont isn’t some kind of odd extremist. He opposes the war in Iraq and thinks his part should take a stand and take action. In this position, he’s with the majority of the American people. I have to note, however, that there are at least a good number of the American people who somehow were dim enough to think the war was going to go better than it has, but that’s the nature of democracy, and one of the best arguments for a representative form of government. The current U. S. congress is one of the best arguments against representative government, but I digress.
But look at the following, from CQPolitics.com:
Lamonts win came amid strong voter turnout. State Democratic Party Chairwoman Nancy DiNardo said 43 percent of eligible Democrats participated in the states first August primary
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Non-Expert Comments
In a post titled A Very Inconvenient Truth, Ben Witherington throws his weight behind global warming and our need to do something about it. I’m glad he has chosen to do so, and not just because I consider his commentary on Revelation to be one of the best available.
And therein seems to lie the problem for some people. One commenter on his blog has called him to account for commenting on something in which he is not an expert. That is a charge that could also be frequently aimed at me, because I comment on many things. In fact, I see my call and mission as a popularizer, so I am almost always reporting things I have found in the works of the actual experts. I’m not terribly comfortable with being an expert. At one time I discovered that there were people at my church who were saying simply that if I could read Hebrew and Greek, and I believed the Bible, then they could too. Of course that bypasses the issue of what, precisely, I believe about the Bible, and of whether one person’s belief or lack of it is an adequate foundation for one’s faith.
But on global warming and a host of other issues the people ultimately making the decisions are going to be non-experts. In our republican system of government, we elect people who make the decisions, but we generally choose those people based on their view on particular issues, as well as our general impression of them as people.
But why should a person like Dr. Witherington, who is clearly expert in New Testament Studies, give his weight to one side of an issue on which he is not at all expert? I think there are several excellent reasons:
- There are others, equally inexpert who are making it a matter of faith not to act with regard to global warming.
- His voice at a minimum provides cover for conservative Christians who want to take action about global warming, but are pressured by others who suggest it’s some sort of liberal conspiracy
- He is very well placed to hear other expert opinion and to give a Christian view on the issue
We should not decide what position to take based on opinions by people who are not experts. But such people often help deal with peripheral issues.
Dr. Witherington says:
The changing of the minds of many conservative Christians is perhaps a clear ensign that we are nearly to the point of recognizing we are dealing with an undeniable truth. Christians are sadly often the last to get religion about worldly things that have been obvious to others for many years. I say this to our shame.
Because some conservative Christians have been in opposition to most actions related to global warming, Dr. Witherington, a conservative Christian himself is well placed to challenge that view. Perhaps Christians are often the last to get the word, but Christian leaders need to be ready to stand out from the crowd and say, “We have been wrong, and we need to take action.” At a minimum, we need to realize that the global warming debate is about facts and the strategies to deal with them, and is one on which Christians can disagree.
But there are some principles at stake. Dr. Witherington asks a series of questions:
What if there will be no escape from the problems of this world for the foreseeable future because Jesus told us to first evangelize all the language groups before the second coming? What if God expects us to properly tend and care for his good and beautiful garden-like creation until his Son comes back? What if when he returns instead he finds us sticking our heads in the sand, and ignoring the many ways we have bruised and abused the earth he created for our eco-system? What if our otherworldly redemption theology involves a gross distortion of the Biblical creation theology?
I suggest you go to his article to see his answers. Those are all topics on which is is expert.
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Missionaries and Mission
John at Locusts and Honey called my attention to Mike Lamson’s post Getting rid of “missionary”. Many of my liberal and non-Christian friends are very surprised to discover that I’m not willing to abandon terms like “mission,” “missionary,” and “evangelism.” I think there are two potential problems with simply changing our terminology. First, we can change the term and keep whatever bad behavior was associated with it, in which case we just revisit the issue in a few years to change terms again. Second, we can change the term because we don’t want to keep up with the good behavior that should be associated with the term.
It reminds me of the Bible translation term “dynamic equivalence,” a term that has been abandoned by most writers on Bible translation (I think so, at least; I haven’t done a survey). But to me the term conveys something that needs to be accomplished in the process of translation. I think that many who disparaged the term were actually hostile to what it meant. Finding a more congenial term didn’t make people do better things; it just changed the words, and in some cases I think it allowed people to claim that they were doing a better job of translation while they kept on doing the same old thing.
In the case of missionary and mission we have a set of terms that have acquired some baggage. We have missionaries calling on people to convert or die, we have missionaries following behind armies, or destroying cultures by their bad behavior. But the fact that there are bad missions and bad missionaries doesn’t mean that there are no missions that need to be accomplished, and that we don’t need people to accomplish them. And those people would be missionaries.
I am the son of missionaries. My father is an MD, and my mother an RN, and they served in medical missions both at home (Canada and the United States), and abroad (Mexico and South America). Caring for the sick was a mission for them, and they were missionaries.
As Christians we are kingdom people. As kingdom people we always have a mission, which is to be witnesses. The particular form that may take will be different from time to time. We are not called to convert people, because that is something that the Holy Spirit will do. But the Holy Spirit will do converting around one’s witnessing. Sometimes witnessing is simply a matter of living one’s life. Sometimes it’s a matter of talking. But in all cases it’s a matter of being a kingdom person.
Now obnoxious people have given the term missionary a dirty name, but the kingdom person will still be on a mission, a mission to be the salt of the earth, to be that little bit of leaven that will change lives and communities. I don’t think changing the term is necessary or useful. I think we do need to change our thinking. But as often as not the problem for mainline Christians especially is not that we are too pushy, i.e. we shine our light in people’s faces, but more that we hide such light as we have under a bushel. A sense of mission would be really helpful to many mainline churches.
In fact, I would suggest that this is the one piece of theology that is most decisive in making mainline churches shrink and more conservative or charismatic churches grow. In the mainline we’ve tended to lose any sense of mission, any sense of direction, any sense that we have anything worth sharing.
I’m talking about the incarnation in another series of posts. Isn’t living a life worthy of the incarnation a mission worth taking on? Isn’t helping someone else to find the power of the resurrection in their own spiritual and emotional life a worthwhile mission? It’s not about being pushy or obnoxious. It’s not about being critical or talking down to people. It’s not about threatening them with the fires of hell, which aren’t under your control in any case. It’s simply about having God’s love in your life, knowing that it’s important, and making it real for others who need it.
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Incarnation Essentials
In a previous post I started a discussion of what I think are the essentials of the Christian faith. I think it’s going to be a bit difficult for me to keep clear when I’m talking about essentials, and when I’m talking about how I apply those in broader detail, but since I believe that is precisely what we, as Christians, must do, I will make every effort.
In simple form, the orthodox doctrine of the incarnation states that Jesus came in the flesh, and that he was wholly human and wholly divine. Many Christians are unsure what this means, as they are about many doctrines. I’d like to restate what I consider the essentials of the doctrine of the incarnation:
God was present on earth in Jesus of Nazereth. Jesus was human enough so that he is able to understand us completely. Jesus was divine enough so that he is able to redeem us.
Now I accept the 100% divine/100% human formulation for myself, but this is what I believe it is essential to believe. Stated even more simply: God wants to save you. God can save you. A Biblical statement is: God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself (2 Corinthians 5:19). I’m going to expand on that, but my expansion is not part of the essentials.
Now as I understand it this reconciliation was the ultimate reconciliation; there is no conceivable reconciliation that could cross a greater gap. God is infinite, we are finite. No matter what you subtract from infinity, it remains infinite. God bridged that gap. In bridging that gap he made all other gaps irrelevant. As Paul put it, “There is no longer Jew or Greek, slave or free, male or female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28). From the incarnational perspective all gaps have become infinitessimal, because they are all to be seen from the perspective of the incarnation, an event that spans infinity.
This is one reason why I reject the complementarian position. I do not believe it is worthy of the incarnation, and I don’t believe that we can accept any doctrine that is not worthy of the full meaning of the incarnation. Coincidentally, Suzanne McCarthy has again been writing about this on the Better Bibles Blog where she comments on the theology of the incarnation, and specifically about the use of male terminology in translations related to it. Why does the ESV translate terms related to the incarnation with male specific references?
In a comment on Suzanne’s post, Peter Kirk calls attention to 1 Peter 1:21, in which qelhmati anqrwpou is translated “will of man,” when the contrast should be “human will” as opposed to divine will. This is a clear focus on the minor human differences which should have been overwhelmed by the reality of the incarnation. In a more relevant case, Philippians 2:7-8, the ESV translates en omoiwmati anqrwpwn as “in the likeness of men” rather than the more precise “in human likeness,” though oddly they use “human” for anqrwpo" in the next sentence. This is thinking that is clearly not worthy of the full impact of the incarnation.
I’m going to reflect more on this later, although I need to move through the essentials in just a few posts, so I’ll leave that further comment for a few days.
Right now I’d also like to relate this concept of the incarnation to the notion of legalism, total depravity, and our ability to save ourselves. I think the doctrine of total depravity is one that again misses the point. It doesn’t matter if we can be righteous. The Bible calls Job righteous, for example. Modern Christians are uncomfortable with that, but the Bible writers had no such concern. The problem is that no matter how righteous one becomes one is still a finite, limited, human being. It is not merely a matter of being wicked that separates us from God; it is a matter of being not-God. No matter how good we can became, we will still be not-God. Any element of eternity must, by nature, be God’s gift. (Note that I do not refer to us becoming gods; rather I refer to all those elements that fall on God’s side of the line, such as eternal life. There is no possibility that we, who are not eternal, could somehow earn eternity. It doesn’t belong to our reality, but to God’s. It is, by definition and by nature, only attainable as God’s gift.) The gap cannot possibly be crossed from our side. It has to be crossed from God’s.
In my next entry I’m going to discuss the two laws given by Jesus, love for God and love for neighbor, and tie them to the definition of the incarnation. I think we can hardly find anything more essential than what Jesus said were the first and second laws.
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Ben Witherington on Supercessionism and Dispensationalism
Ben Witherington has an excellent post on Hebrews and supercessionism and dispensationalism. I don’t agree with every point he makes, though I do agree with the bulk of it, and I consider this a good article to read to help clarify the theology of Hebrews.
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Evolution reversed to rebuild old gene
This article on MSNBC.com talks about some interesting gene splicing that illustrates some of the value of evolutionary theory and also shows in a simple way how information could be added to DNA.
Genes are snippets of DNA that carry instructions for building a protein. The splitting of one gene into many genes has occurred many times throughout life’s history. With two identical genes, one can continue doing its normal job while the other is free to mutate. Most mutations are harmful and disappear, but every once in a while one proves beneficial to the organism and is passed on to future generations.
Just so. But try to tell the creationists just how all that works.
Early animals had 13 Hox genes until about 500 million years ago. Those 13 Hox genes multiplied four times, but some were lost because they were redundant. Today, humans and other mammals have 39 Hox genes.
Yep! Information can increase.
This article is also interesting in terms of gene therapy and the procedures being learned, of course. The ability to recreate even a portion of an older gene like this is fascinating. As noted in the article, it brings images of Jurassic park. I won’t start watching for approaching dinosaurs yet, but I’m amazed at how fast this research is moving!
Updated to add link to the article which I missed first time around, and also to add a link to PZ Myer’s much better commentary on the topic at Regulatory Evolution of the Hox1 Gene.
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Feingold on the Elections
MSNBC has an interview with Senator Russ Feingold in which he makes some excellent points. There are many things I disagree with Senator Feingold about, but he is right on target on a number of others. For example he says:
People in Wisconsin, and everywhere for that matter, want their elected officials to stand up for what they believe. Democrats arent going to win in November simply by running out the clock. We need to show the American people that we stand for things like guaranteed health care for all Americans, bringing the troops home from Iraq, and defending the rule of law.
I’m just going to speak as an independent here. I give my vote to various candidates. I’m not much concerned about party labels, and I also don’t have any single issue that drives my vote. I can disagree with a candidate on a number of issues if I believe he or she has integrity and some good sense. Democrats won’t get my vote simply by not being Republicans (or the reverse); they have to have their own strategy, their own vision for the country, and a willingness to stand up for those things. That’s probably a great deal to expect of a politician, but that’s what I’m looking for.
This is where the Democratic Party has to catch up with its own supporters. There is a populist movement, a desire for the party to stand for populist positions and strong positions, both international and domestically. All over the country, people are saying the same thing to me. And it is out there in a way I have ever seen before. If the Democratic Party doesnt have the sense to catch this wave, we may pay for it.
Precisely! You can’t continually win elections and hold onto power simply by not offending people. You have to challenge them, engage their interest, and earn (not get, earn) their confidence. I think John Kerry would be President of the United States right now if he had simply managed to convince the American people that he had some sort of plan. The problem was that he was sort of not-Bush, and then not all that sure what positive content being not-Bush was supposed to have.
People voted for the positive plan.
I agree with Senator Feingold that we will have quite a few surprising results, but that’s not much of a prediction. The question I have is whether there is a politician or group of politicians left out there who can catch the attention of the American people in a positive way. I’m watching for such a group and ready to be active. Right now neither the Republican nor the Democratic parties are looking all that good.
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Christian Essentials: Incarnation at the Center
One of my principles of constructive criticism is that one should generally be prepared to propose something positive. This doesn’t always work–sometimes you know one solution won’t work before you have an alternative, but generally I think it’s a good rule. So having said some negative things about the Together for the Gospel statement, I think I should say something about what I do believe.
As I thought about this project, I came to realize more and more that there are differences between what I consider the core of my experience and the logical center of my beliefs. But as I thought even more about it, they seemed to come back together. I see both now as kind of the layers of an onion, but we start at the center and move out, the core being the most essential, and the outer layers less so. I have previously discussed the importance of distinguishing essential and non-essential doctrines in order to have some unity or coherence of the faith, but at the same time be able to include and celebrate appropriate diversity. I think my best reasonable length statement on this is Unity, Diversity, and Confusion. You can follow some links from there. I also listed four doctrinal items that I hold as essential, which I derived from Elgin Hushbeck Jr.’s Consider Christianity books. (You can see a brief summary at Understanding Christian Apologetics.) But neither of those provides either the reason why I would consider those things essential, nor does it put the life into it.
I’m going to try to be brief on each of these entries (STOP LAUGHING!), but I will make a number of entries in this series. In the early stages I’ll be making statements that I will leave to back up later, and also I will use scriptures without developing their interpretation from the context, but I will try to remember to tie up all the loose ends as I go on.
So what does put life into it? I believe the life gets there by putting the right thing at the center and then keeping it centered.
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Tongues and Hearing
Adrian Warnock has quoted a section from Martin Lloyd Jones on the gift of tongues in Acts 2 and 1 Corinthians 12-14. (Thanks for Peter Kirk for linking to earlier parts of this discussion.)
There are two comments I would like to make on this issue, both of which relate to the Biblical background material.
First, commenting on the view that Acts 2 and 1 Corinthians refer to two completely different gifts, he says (as quoted by Adrian Warnock):
But, again speaking for myself, I find it very difficult to accept that view because I find that the terms which are used in Acts and in 1 Corinthians are precisely the same and it seems to me to be unnecessary to postulate two different meanings, if one will account for it all. ‘But,’ someone may say, ‘we are told that on the Day of Pentecost everyone heard the apostles speaking in their own language.’ Of course. That seems to me to be a part of the miracle that took place. In other words, I suggest that, by the power of the Holy Spirit, the people who were listening were enabled to hear in their own language though their own language was not being spoken.
I think there is a bit of a problem here in that the use of the same terms in different contexts need not have precisely the same meaning. Terms generally have a range of meanings, and we might better ask the question of just what range of meaning these terms can have. They are clearly used in different contexts. In Acts there is no mention of any problem with understanding. There are those who say they are drunk, and presumably do not understand the speech, but that is not an example of a problem with the gift in action, but rather with the response. In the Corinthian church we have the gift used in a worship service, not in a purely evangelistic setting. We clearly have some people exercising their tongues (double meaning intentional), while nobody is understanding, and thus nobody is being built up. We have individuals giving the interpretation, indicating that only some were able to understand, at least on a regular basis.
Dr. Lloyd-Jones has a good point, I think, when he points to a miracle of hearing, rather than one of speaking. But are these differences sufficient to show that this was a different gift? I question whether this is so. I would suggest that the gift of tongues should be given a broader range, as a gift of divine communication, perhaps an impartation of God’s control over language itself. This was applied in Acts through a miracle of hearing, because that fit the situation. It can be applied in prayer individually to a form of spiritual communication, and it can be applied in the worship service with interpretation. All of these instances would refer to the same gift, but in different circumstances.
I would note here that often in discussing spiritual gifts we take a restrictive sense, determining that only the precise application of a gift that we can find described in scripture is appropriate. I would rather apply an inclusive sense, determining the outer boundaries of the gift of tongues scripturally, and allowing the actual application of the gift to flow within those boundaries.
A second point I would like to note is this, again quoting Dr. Lloyd-Jones:
So if you meet people who say they speak in tongues, or if you have been at a meeting where this is claimed, and if there was disorder and confusion, then you are entitled to say, in terms of the scriptural teaching, that whatever else it may have been, it was not the gift of tongues as described in the church at Corinth.
Adrian Warnock commented earlier on his post on this part of the quote:
The Doctor is not easily pidgeon-holed and seems to want to, in one sense, go further than most charismatics would go by saying that tongues in Acts AND 1 Corinthians were not, in fact, foreign languages. He is eager to stress the need for decency and order, however, to the point where he believes that tongues not done in order cannot actually be tongues at all – which seems a bit strange since Paul seems to be addressing a situation where disordered tongue-speaking WAS in fact occurring.
I think I see here possibly the result of another difference in understanding the gifts of the Spirit. I don’t know Dr. Lloyd Jones’s work well enough to know how he approached this, but it’s worth calling attention to the difference anyhow.
Some interpreters who do belief that the gifts continue, don’t see the gifts as given to the person for that person to exercise, but rather see the gift as given for a specific occasion. One description I have heard is: “I have been given the gift of healing (or some other gift) at some times.” In this view, the gift of the Holy Spirit is given for a specific time and place, and thus if something that appeared to be a gift was exercised out of order, one could not attribute it to the Holy Spirit; that would be accusing the Holy Spirit of disorder.
I believe it is more in accord with scripture to view the gifts as given to the individual Christian (though distributed according to the will of God for the needs of the church), and that the individual must choose to exercise them under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Due to our own imperfection, we could exercise our gifts improperly. That improper exercise could involve the gift of tongues just as easily as it could involve the gift of teaching. I don’t lose my ability to teach just because I’ve taught error. I’m given the responsibility to exercise my gift properly.
As an illustration, the first time I encountered a word from the Lord given in a tongue followed by an interpretation, the individual with the word spoke first, and then the pastor called for the interpretation. In the end, we had both the tongue and the interpretation together and thus order. But I happen to know that the interpreter didn’t really want to give that word; she was obedient and spoke, but she could have chosen to be silent. Would the Holy Spirit have been retroactively less present in the original word because the interpreter refused to present the hard message she would rather not have presented?
I acknowledge that I don’t have a slam dunk on this, but I do think that it is much more in accord with scripture, especially with the stories of God’s servants, to see gifts as given with the one who receives them having the opportunity and responsibility to use those gifts appropriately.