Threads from Henry's Web

Category: Christianity

  • Christian Carnival CCCIX Posted

    … at RodneyOlsen.net.  Go check out the first Christian Carnival of the new year.  (No, I didn’t contribute anything this week.)

  • Looking the Part – on Worldprayr

    No, that’s not a misspelling. @worldprayr is an international prayer organization started on Twitter. Since many of us have been following this organization for some time on Twitter, we’re used to calling it by it’s twitter ID. I wrote a post for the World Prayer Blog which was published today. It is titled Looking the Part and draws heavily from the first 12 verses of 2 Corinthians 4.

    I didn’t mention it there, but I want to do so here–I have been really enjoying Frank J. Matera’s New Testament Library commentary on 2 Corinthians. I’ve been reading through that book rather slowly, and spending a good deal of time with the text of Corinthians. Matera does an exceptional job of both covering the critical issues quickly and providing theological reflection that is relevant to living, teaching, and preaching the message.

    Enjoy, and please comment there.

  • News Flash – I am Very Conservative

    Despite the subtitle of my other blog, Threads from Henry’s Web, which reads “Thoughts on Religion in the World from a passionate, moderate, liberal charismatic Christian”, it appears that on this blog I am very conservative. So saith N. T. Wrong, and who am I to argue?

    He says this in a new Biblioblog Top 50, in which I rank #7.

    How shall I ever go on living? 🙂

    (HT: The Church of Jesus Christ)

  • Mere Christians

    Jim Skaggs has an interesting post on this at One Eternal Day. I am generally in agreement, though I tend to emphasize practice over belief in terms of essentials.

    It appears Jim is a Seventh-day Baptist, which interests me as an ex-Seventh-day Adventist. Adventists received the doctrine of the Sabbath via the Seventh-day Baptists. I’m adding his blog to my Google reader account.

    (HT: Pseudo-Polymath)

  • David Ker – Gay Africa

    David Ker has taken on the world at ThinkChristian.net, or so it probably seems to him. The comments provide some additional links and some vigorous comment.

  • Is Intelligent Design Religious?

    David Opderbeck has an excellent post on the question of whether intelligent design (ID) is religious and how this relates to our view of natural theology. (HT: Through a Glass Darkly)

    In the post, he gets into an issue that I have raised before, which is the question of whether we really want to advocate teaching of a sort of “creation lite” (my term) in public school classrooms. I personally say this not form the perspective of keeping religion out of the public school classroom, but rather to keep the state out of the business of teaching religion. I believe that two things generally result from the state trying to teach religion: 1) They do it badly, and 2) They tend eventually to want to enforce whatever it is they have decided to teach.

    Opderbeck says:

    But even if a plausible argument could be made for the constitutionality of teaching some version of ID in a public school, I personally find this “wedge” strategy pragmatically and theologically suspect….[I’ll leave you to go discover the analogy he uses where I have the ellipsis!]

    The imagined Christian majority in this country often seems to believe that whatever is taught in the classroom will be acceptable to them. But a review of the differences in viewpoint among Christians on many issues should suggest that it is difficult to create a single course that is acceptable to all. I would not object to a course in the Bible as literature, for example, provided it was clear that this was not a class in the Bible as a source or object of faith.

    I think Christians ought to seriously consider whether or not strategies used to get some form of religion taught in the public school classroom might do more damage to faith than their potential benefit (or damage) to the state. Perhaps we should recapture the notion that it is the task of parents to pass on their faith to their children.

  • Is Inerrancy an Essential Christian Doctrine

    Obviously I don’t think so, but I must now add C. Michael Patton to the list of those who do accept the doctrine of inerrancy themselves, yet don’t believe it is an essential of the Christian faith, which he does in his humorous “AND OTHER STUPID STATEMENTS” series, If the Bible is not Inerrant, then Christianity is False.

    Dr. Patton lists many of the reasons I have listed as to why the doctrine of inerrancy tends to breed other problems, such as a Christianity that is bibliocentric but not Christocentric.  Now let me be clear that one can actually be both, provided one always is more Christo- then biblio-centric.  One can also lose sight of Christ because one puts too low a value on scripture that points to Him.

    Other than the fact that I am a Christian who no longer accepts the doctrine of inerrancy, even in its more nuanced forms, I agree with Dr. Patton’s article.  I find his story of Gregg very interesting as well, and it reflects many, many stories I’ve heard as well.

    In fact, the first reaction I usually get when I tell folks I left the church pretty much at the same time I received my MA in Religion, is that I must have discovered errors in the Bible and thus lost my faith.  But that is not the case.  My problem was with what I saw as the all-encompassing claims of Christ which in turn led me to question the validity of such a leap–not merely a leap of faith, but one also of deep trust.

    I think that both those who think they must hold to the doctrine of inerrancy or lose their faith entirely, and those who abandon the faith because they discover errors make a common mistake.  They make the Christian faith primarily about the knowledge of facts.  Now doubtless there are facts involved with Christianity.  Jesus either died for my sins or he did not.  He was either raised from the did or he was not.

    But my belief doesn’t alter those facts.  More importantly, my simple acknowledgment of the evidence for certain facts doesn’t constitute Christian faith.  After all, even the devils believe and trouble.  For one to be in Christ, however, one needs to believe and trust, and that trust goes beyond the facts.

    For me, the experience of life trusting in Jesus has made it one or another fact from scripture proven either right or wrong is going to change that basic trust.  “Jesus Christ and Him crucified” has become the unshakable center and I can examine other things openly with no fear.

  • Patriarch Bartholomew on 60 Minutes

    HT: Allan Bevere.

  • Reconciling the Gospel Genealogies

    There are generally two reactions I hear to this in Sunday School classes and church pews–it’s either fascination, as if the genealogies make or break the Bible or complete indifference, as in “who cares?”

    Both reactions miss the point.  Matthew and Luke are each making a point, and they are making it in a way that their early readers probably understood fairly well, though there is disagreement on the meaning in some quite early literature.

    There’s a great article on the genealogies and their meaning on the Christianity Today web site.  I think this presentation illustrates the importance of not reconciling texts before we understand what they’re trying to say as they are.  Many treatments of this issue simply list possible resolutions of the differences, which misses the message that each evangelist was trying to convey.

    Grant Osborne, the author, says:

    Examining each genealogy closely reveals the authors’ different purposes.

    Just so.  Go, read and enjoy!

  • Changing Polls

    No, President Obama’s approval rating; the poll that I have in the right hand sidebar.  It has been there for more than 18 months, and surprisingly enough is still generating interest.  The last comment is dated December 19, 2009 and there have been quite a number.  You can see the results here.

     Who does God hate?  
    Selection   Votes 
    Everyone, because we are all sinners  3% 13 
    Only unrepentant sinners  9% 40 
    All non-Christians  2% 9 
    Those who have never said the sinner’s prayer  0% 0 
    Nobody, God loves everybody  77% 330 
    Other (please comment)  9% 39 
    431 votes total 
    pollcode.com free polls
    		 

    In case anyone wants to keep this poll alive even further past its sell-by date, I’m including the form as well:

    Who does God hate?
    Everyone, because we are all sinners
    Only unrepentant sinners
    All non-Christians
    Those who have never said the sinner’s prayer
    Nobody, God loves everybody
    Other (please comment)
      
    pollcode.com free polls