Threads from Henry's Web

Category: Religion

All posts relating to religion, including those on the relationship of religion to other fields, such as science and politics

  • Looking for a UMC Pastor in the West or Northwest

    My wife Jody is looking for a pastor in the west or northwest to answer about 5 questions regarding ministry in the UMC, with the interview to be published in the Bible Study Paths WebZine. She’s looking for someone who is currently pastoring a church. Your interview responses will be published in September alongside those from one pastor in the southeast and one in the midwest.

    No, there’s no money in it, and Bible Study Paths is new and small, but we hope the answers to these questions will help others in ministry.

    Please respond by comment to this post. She’ll e-mail you with the questions.

  • Dismissing as Wrong

    In an article that I find very agreeable, Chaplain Mike of the Internet Monk site discusses the way in which some churches major on the minors, making people who disagree with specific doctrinal positions uncomfortable.

    But I want to object to one line in that post, and it’s one I hear frequently in real life as well. It’s this:

    Furthermore, the Biblical teaching was pure dogmatism, completely dismissing all other views as wrong.

    What I find troubling about the part I highlighted is that there should be any problem with calling a view “wrong.” “Dismissing” I don’t like so much. What you do with a “wrong” idea is study and discuss it. But I think there’s nothing wrong–and much right–with deciding that certain ideas are wrong and other are right.

    If I get into a discussion with a young earth creationist I will begin with the fact that I consider him wrong. I assume he considers me wrong as well. Otherwise we would have nothing to discuss. For some reason it seems that many people today think that all ideas must be regarded as equal else one is intolerant or worse. I would suggest instead that tolerance involves tolerating someone I actually think is wrong.

    Now in church, regarding someone else as wrong doesn’t mean that I also must regard them as unchristian, out of fellowship, or unworthy of leadership positions. In fact, if I did that, I’d have to make a church of one, and even that would be a problem as I’ve been wrong many times in my life, as evidenced by changing my mind! I was either wrong before or perhaps I’m wrong now.

    I’ve disagreed with just about every church budget I’ve seen passed. I’d go so far as to say that some of these budgets are wrong. For example, I think that spending less than 2% on missions and outreach is wrong, and I’m going to call it wrong. I consider it the right thing to do!

    I think we need to learn to live together whilst being wrong and working with other people who are wrong. Only when we keep the categories of right and wrong can we try to learn to be more right.

  • Christian Perfection – Not So Plain to Me!

    One of my early experiences teaching in a United Methodist Church involved giving a series on the Wesleyan doctrine of Christian perfection. That may seem surprising for a new member of a United Methodist congregation, but my background in the Seventh-day Adventist Church involved a good deal of Wesleyan talk (though not the doctrine of Christian perfection), and the pastor was also well aware that I had borrowed the United Methodist Discipline before joining his church, and had read all the doctrinal sections. Further, I’d read Wesley’s compilation, A Plain Account of Christian Perfection.

    To make a long story short–and I intend this to be short!–I discovered that of the group of 30 or so people who arrived for the first class, only the pastor and I were aware that there actually was any such doctrine.

    To be honest, I still wasn’t the best one to teach such a doctrine. I suspect that if I were trying to be a United Methodist pastor, rather than a theologically educated layman, I would choke on the “going on toward perfection” question. And yes, I know that the words come from the book of Hebrews, one of my favorites. (I’ve even written a study guide!) Nonetheless, I think I’d want to nuance my answer, perhaps to such an extent that it wouldn’t be an answer at all.

    In any case, I like short descriptions of this doctrine so that United Methodists, and others who are curious about it, can get a good idea of what John Wesley was teaching. (Hint–he wasn’t teaching what most people think when they first here the phrase “Christian perfection.”)

    So all this verbiage (never use one word where 1,000 will do!) is to introduce a good link on the subject, from Craig Adams’ web site Commonplace Holiness. He is presenting a public domain book, and the whole thing is there, but section 2 provides a good definition. If you are interested, you can follow this further by going to the table of contents and finding more.

    In any discussion of a controversial topic, it’s a good idea to get the definitions straight, and this topic certainly qualifies.

  • Quote of the Day – June 23

    From Dave Black Online, Rhino Evangelism:

    What a tragedy that some Christians, while having a commendable zeal for evangelism, also display the sweet approachability of a rhinoceros!

  • Bruce Epperly on Prayer Changing Things

    I wrote recently that I prefer “prayer changes you” to “prayer changes things” but I don’t deny that prayer changes things. But how?

    Bruce Epperly contributes a post to Ponderings on a Faith Journey that looks at this along with the idea of human freedom. I know that any form of open theism tends to make some people crazy, but I think many of us talk and behave as though something like this is true, even while affirming God’s eternal plans. In fact, I might suggest that living with such tensions is something God intended us to do! Nonetheless I find this discussion challenging and useful.

    For my own notes on prayer, which come to a somewhat less firm conclusion, see my essays The Hand of God, The Hand of God – Miracles, and The Hand of God – Prayer. They date from ancient times, or rather 2003.

  • Fouling the Water and Trampling the Food

    That’s my post today on the Worldprayr blog. It’s based on parts of Ezekiel 34.

  • On Character, Discontent, and the Old Testament

    I have somewhat of a tradition of reflecting somewhere on my blogs about books I am about to publish. So today I want to look at Allan R. Bevere’s new book The Character of Our Discontent.

    Allan is a primarily New Testament trained preacher who has decided to take on some major passages in the Old Testament in preaching to his congregation. In turn, he has collected them to share with others.

    My friend Alden Thompson, who is author of Who’s Afraid of the Old Testament God?, also from my company, generally leads off weekends of discussion of the Old Testament with a litany of the reasons that people don’t like the Old Testament. He then takes a look at the Old Testament in the New, and especially in the teachings of Jesus and then he’ll say something like: “So you may not like the Old Testament, but Jesus did!” Now he says it so nicely that nobody is offended, but he certainly catches people’s attention.

    I specialized in Hebrew and ancient near eastern literature, so I tend to lean toward the Old Testament in my own study and teaching. But amongst those who teach outside the seminary, that is all too rare.

    I had a conversation just days before I accepted this manuscript for publication. A pastor with many years of experience lamented the lack of collections of good sermons, sermons that could provide an example to new preachers. I had to agree with him. In my experience, many people end up as pastors with much too limited knowledge and experience in some of the basics. I think preaching is better taught in most seminaries than subjects such as prayer, spiritual gifts, or even church management, but nonetheless there is a great value in having more material that covers some of the basics. So I found this combination irresistible, even though sermon collections often have poor track records for sales.

    There are two values in this collection that I want to emphasize. First, these sermons introduce some Old Testament characters and situations in a way that is easy to understand. They are worth reading on their own. This book isn’t heavy reading. You could read one of these sermons for a quite reasonable devotional. Second, they provide examples for people who may be afraid to start preaching from the Old Testament because they didn’t specialize in it. Now these are not sermons that come from hasty or light preparation. What they are is solid sermons that come from a non-specialist who put in the time to produce a good sermon on each topic.

    The presentation is easy to follow. The illustrations are good and to the point. You’ll find yourself directed to some good resources as you read. Allan doesn’t try to solve all the problems of Old Testament interpretation. What he does is apply some of the principles and lessons of these passages to the people found in the pews today.

    I’ve mentioned some books that I agonized over before publishing. I’ve even had some I expected would offend some folks. I didn’t have to agonize over this one. I was certain almost from the start that I was going to publish it. Oh, it might offend you in some places, though if so I’d take it as conviction. Some of those Old Testament characters provide quite a challenge to our very un-heavenly way of life here in the American church.

    So if you’ve been neglecting the Old Testament, here’s a chance to remedy that situation. My wife tells me that she feels that before she started getting involved in reading and studying the Old Testament she feels she was missing out on half the power God had for her in his Word.

    Or, as Dave Black said in commenting on the release of The Character of Our Discontent:

    An Old Testament-neglecting Christian is a contradiction in terms.

  • Adrian Warnock on the Doctrine of Scripture

    And as you might expect, I’m disagreeing with him. In introducing a post urging people to read Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology (not a bad idea), he says:

    There is no more foundational subject than the doctrine of Scripture. All the current theological arguments that are causing such disruption in the Church today stem from a lack of confidence in the authority of Scripture. …

    Now the first part of that statement is pretty obvious and quite foundational. I don’t think we can be Christian and talk about being Christian without dealing with the doctrine of scripture. However far you may end up away from regarding scripture as foundational, you’re going to have to deal with this doctrine.

    As it happens, I believe that scripture is foundational, and whatever we believe must be rooted in it. Not only our doctrine of scripture, but also our hermeneutic that is derived from that basic doctrine is critical in how we will understand and live our faith. I would like to see us discuss this more.

    But the second sentence is quite problematic, and I think represents one of the greatest barriers to sound dialog within orthodox Christianity today. Let me quote it again:

    All the current theological arguments that are causing such disruption in the Church today stem from a lack of confidence in the authority of Scripture.

    Um, not so much. Now there are people who lack confidence in scripture, and this can lead them to many odd views, views which fall outside of reasonable definitions of the bounds of Christianity. There are also people who express (at least) great confidence in scripture but who show no great ability to actually discover what it’s saying.

    Yes, there are certain disputes which results from differences in various people’s confidence in scripture, but I don’t think they are the major ones, and I especially don’t think they are the bulk of those that are debated within orthodox Christianity.

    Let’s illustrate with a point I’ve debated (indirectly via blog post) with Adrian before, penal substitutionary atonement. For Adrian, nothing less than viewing penal substitution as the meaning of atonement is adequate.

    I believe that penal substitution does occur in scripture, but that it is one of a number of metaphors, all of which are required for an understanding of the atonement. I believe this, not because I lack confidence in scripture, but because I am confident that a full scriptural understanding of the atonement requires much more than penal substitution. Like every other finite description, using penal substitution exclusively or even to diminish other views, especially in my view christus victor, diminishes our understanding of the atonement.

    From the evidence of reading Adrian’s blogging over several years, I’m certain that penal substitution is a “current theological argument” and is “causing disruption” and thus I must exclude it from any list of those based on a lack of confidence in scripture.

    I think I made my best statement on this in my post from last Easter, Atonement: The Error Adrian Warnock and Giles Fraser Share.

    I see a similar type of issue in the debates over creation and evolution and certain major figures in reformed Old Testament studies, such as Peter Enns, Bruce Waltke, and Tremper Longman. I think it would be ridiculous to assert that these three men lack confidence in scripture, yet they are in the middle of a theological controversy. The difference is not confidence but the way in which they understand scripture.

    In connection with this I appreciated Jeremy Pierce’s recent post, Arguments Against Old Earth, in which he reclaims the term “creationism” for any set of beliefs that God created the universe. I am a creationist, because I believe in God the creator. I do want to debate a bit about Jeremy’s categories, though they are really quite good. That’s for another post.

    In summary I would say that the problem in most theological debates within Christianity is not confidence but understanding. There is an element here where one’s hermeneutics make the decision, but in a number of cases, such as understanding 2 Corinthians 5 an imputed righteousness, I think often the hermeneutics are similar, but the application is different. Confidence, however, is not part of the problem.

    (Note: I have not yet read, but I do intend to read Adrian’s book Raised with Christ: How the Resurrection Changes Everything.)

  • Link to Roundup on Bruce Waltke

    Brian LePort has a good roundup of commentary on this issue which also mentions Tremper Longman. (HT: sunestauromai)

  • Of ID, Evolution, Christianity, and Blasphemy

    There’s quite a bit of discussion amongst the blogs that cover creation and evolution regarding the claim that ID is blasphemy. I got started on this with Jason Rosenhouse on the Evolution Blog, but he got started with an article in the University of St. Thomas Journal of Law and Public Policy by Peter M. J. Hess of the National Center for Science Education.

    There are quite a few topics in the article and in the responses, but I want to address just one issue. First, however, I want to note that while Hess calls the idea that early opposition to evolution was essentially religious the “warfare myth”:

    Since the publication of On the Origin of Species in 1859,11 in which Darwin laid out a meticulously substantiated case for his theory of evolution, the debate about design has taken some fascinating turns. The reception of On the Origin of Species was not as the “warfare myth” portrayed it, with godless volutionary scientists ranged against biblical literalist theologians and bishops. Darwin‘s theory met a mixed reception, with some theologians enthusiastically endorsing it as compatible with religious belief, and some scientists vigorously opposing it on scientific grounds.12 Darwin himself gradually abandoned Christianity as he found its teleological presuppositions to be incompatible with empirical evidence supporting natural selection, although John Brooke has inferred that Darwin‘s loss of traditional faith had more to do with his emotional response to the tragic death of his daughter Annie.13 Although the theory of
    evolution was in some respects consonant with Darwin‘s agnosticism, it was not necessarily the cause of Darwin‘s beliefs.

    I don’t know the history well enough to comment on this in detail, but I think it is clear that modern opposition to evolution comes primarily from a religious foundation, as Dr. Michael Zimmerman (of the Clergy Letter project) notes in a recent blog post. It’s valuable to break down early opposition to evolution so that we can see that not all theologians were opposed at the time, but then again, not all theologians are opposed now.

    There is a particular set of religious beliefs, however, that must be in opposition to evolution, and that is a belief that the Bible in its early chapters provides a form of narrative history. In addition, even those who take some of that text figuratively may see certain aspects, such as a literal first Adam and a literal fall based on the sin of the first couple, as necessarily literally true. In turn, a number of other theological points regarding soteriology hang on those elements.

    We’ve seen the importance of these points to some in the evangelical community with the resignation of Dr. Bruce Waltke from RTS Orlando (regarding which I blogged on Friday), and of Dr. Tremper Longman from his reformed seminary (via Michael F. Bird). I must note that while I admire both these men tremendously, I do understand how folks in their theological stream can have a problem with their beliefs. Agreement is not necessary to understanding, in my view.

    Which leads me back to the issue of ID and blasphemy. Quoting again from Dr. Hess:

    What are the central theological failings of intelligent design? First, it is blasphemous. Intelligent design constrains God to work within the limits of what its adherents can understand about nature. In so doing, it reduces God from the status of creator to that of mere designer, and a not very competent one at that, … [text continues with a quotation-HN]

    I have previously called intelligent design (ID) bad theology. But I need to clarify what I mean by bad theology. Most often when used in conversation, “bad theology” simply refers to “theology with which the speaker disagrees,” and thus is just another way of saying “I disagree.” I think there is are only a very few ways in which one can apply the label “bad theology” with any objectivity. First one can apply it to a self-contradictory theology, with the caveat that some theology embraces contradiction. Second, one can apply it to theology that is not precisely what it claims to be.

    I think ID suffers from its roots as more of a political strategy than an attempt to be either pure science or pure theology. It’s part of a distinctly American attempt to get creationist ideas past the wall of separation of church and state as understood by American courts. So it has ideas that sound like theology, some that sound like philosophy, and some that at least attempt to sound like science. I don’t see ID as being good science, but that’s not my point here.

    Where I encounter ID in person is from lay people in the church who have read one or another of the books or articles on the subject. Without exception, those I have talked to believe, after reading such material, that science has proven that God exists and that God created. Most ID advocates would not claim explicitly that they have done any such thing, and many would go out of their way to deny it. To me that is a sign of bad theology–it seems to do one thing, yet it does another.

    The problem with tying this sort of thing down comes from the hybrid nature of ID. I believe in intelligent design myself, not ID the theory, but intelligent design, the classical theology. God is the designer, and the entire universe is designed. One basis on which I would reject ID the theory is simply that I don’t believe that one part of creation is more or less designed than another–God is ultimately the cause of all things, whether he moved directly or indirectly. But that is a theological view, not a scientific one. So I can call ID bad theology from my perspective, but only in the sense that I disagree.

    I do indeed believe it is God of the gaps theology, in which things not scientifically explained are claimed as proofs of the activity of some intelligent designer. Once this gets into church, as I’ve noted, the designer is automatically assumed to be God. I think it is quite proper for folks in church to assume the designer is God. Any blame I would place on those who try to present intelligent design with some other designer. I really think very few take that seriously except as a political side-step. So if your theology opposes God of the gaps, then I think you should oppose intelligent design (ID the theory).

    In one sense, ID says too much, but in another too little. God’s creative activity is, in my view, all encompassing. I believe that is in accord with the biblical view as well. God is also infinite, and thus doesn’t have to pay less attention to one thing than another. Such prioritization is the result of limitation. Because I am finite, I cannot pay full attention to all of my grandchildren at one time. God could create a mechanism that produces a mechanism that produces a mechanism, for any length of chain he desires, and still have his full attention available to every part of the process.

    But again, that is comparing my theology to the theology of ID advocates, thus calling this bad theology is simply another way of saying that I disagree.

    I think that saying that ID is blasphemous is an instance of this latter usage of “bad theology.” It seems blasphemous under my theology to discover that God is more involved one place than another or that God is more the designer of life than another.

    The ID advocate, however, would likely simply claim that he is arguing that God’s design is more detectable in one place than another. While I would not think it correct, I would hardly call it blasphemous to assert that God chose to show his fingerprints more in some cases than others. I don’t think so, but I don’t think it’s blasphemy to suggest it.

    Any problems that are brought up by less than optimum design in nature, as cited by Hess, are problems for theistic evolutionists as much as for any ID advocate, I believe. In my view, that is none at all. I would suggest it is necessary to see God giving a certain freedom in nature to explain the process of creation in any case, whether or not God interferes in the process. I find it much more elegant to think that the form of creation comes through seamlessly, that God does not play with the rules along the way, but that is just my view, not an example of good theology vs. bad.

    I think it is valid to point out theological difficulties with ID in the first sense I have mentioned. Do people really understand the implications? What does it say about God? Is it, in fact, theology at all? Those are valid points of discussion. But in all such discussions we need to acknowledge that theology is not a body of knowledge with a single standard for what is right and wrong, and what is good and bad. We need to ask “Bad in what way? Why? In reference to what theological system?”

    One last note on compatibilism. Is evolution compatible with Christian theology? Again, one has to definte that theology. Not only is such compatibility dependent on a certain understanding of texts in Genesis (or perhaps not holding a certain understanding), but it does depend on certain concepts in soteriology. I think the two can be compatible, but I do not think the issue is trivial.