As many of you know, I have been
back and forth lately with Dan Trabue over a number of issues th
century and to excommunicate those who refuse to receive said dogma with all
humility. The purpose of this post is to show the reader how Dan claims one
thing and thing tries to say that he is not claiming the very thing he is
claiming. It is the same slight-of-hand
nonsense we observed in men like Rob Bell, Doug Pagitt, and Brian McLaren.
Dan’s first claim is that ANE
writers did not write with the same aim of modern historians. What Dan means is
that ANE writers were more concerned with doing something other than just transmitting historical facts as they occurred when they wrote. First
of all, like any good slight of hand movement, there is some truth in the
statement. However, the statement is much more controversial Dan admits.
Second, the statement is far too general. Third, the statement assumes that the
Ancient Hebrew Scriptures follow the ANE model in recording historical
narrative, which also assumes that the motivation and forces behind the Hebrew
Scriptures were the same as every other ANE text. That these assumptions are
patently false seems obvious to anyone but those with the most extreme
prejudice. Dan’s view destroys the universal fall humanity and, along with it,
the doctrine of original sin. If there was no literal Adam to fall, there could
be no literal, universal fall. If Adam was not the federal head of man, there
was no federal head of man. If that is true, men can obtain righteousness and
be saved apart from Christ by simply not sinning. Yet, Dan spins, claiming to
believe that we are all sinners even though he has removed the very foundation
for his own claims.
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| Luke Included Adam and Seth in his genealogy |
I pointed out that Luke, in his
genealogy of Christ, include Adam and Seth among the many other generations
from Christ back to Adam. My reason for doing so was so that Dan might realize
that Luke, writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, accepted the view
that Adam and Seth were historical people living at a point in time. Dan
rejected Luke’s account although he provided no alternative explanation and
then claimed that we do not know what God’s opinion of what Luke wrote might be.
Now, if Dan believes Luke was wrong, he must also believe that God believes
that Luke was wrong. Yet, he says we just don’t know God’s opinion of Luke’s
account. I suppose Dan could argue that Luke mixes myth and legend into
geological records while providing a certification of the historicity of Christ
and his Messianic office. But such a move would seem to be, not just logically
incoherent and absurd, it would be philosophically outrageous. Yet, Dan denies
holding the view that Luke’s writings are unreliable. He wants to attest that
Luke is reliable while claiming on this point that Luke was wrong, or in other
words, unreliable. This is the two-faced spin that emergent thinkers love to
play games with. They hold a view while claiming NOT to hold a view. How long
did we know that Rob Bell rejected the Scriptures and endorsed homosexual sex
before he finally came out and admitted it?
Dan has repeatedly said the Bible
is not the Word of God and that the Scriptures are not binding, nor
ipso facto, claiming that this was just
Paul’s opinion. At the same time, Dan has attempted to employ a certain
authority over me by informing me that I cannot slander him because slander is
forbidden. I have to ask, by whom? Whose authority forbids me to slander? Oh,
the same text that forbids slander is the text that Dan wants to argue in
another place has no authority and is not binding. And then Dan wants people to
believe that he really doesn’t believe the things I am accusing him of. Once
again, we see the sinister spin of the sinister sinner at work. It really is
outrageous and would be comical if it were not so wicked and rebellious.
In addition to Dan’s denial of a
literal Adam which must mean a denial of a literal fall and the necessity for a
literal redemption in Christ, Dan has denied the reliability of Luke along with
the authority of Paul specifically and all of Scripture in general. At the same
time, Dan wants us to believe that he is a Christian. Now, as one might guess,
Dan also embraces homosexuality. Dan claims that marriage and sex are open to
all that want it and that God is perfectly fine with such arrangements. I am
sure Dan has read the supposed apologetic for gay Christianity and is familiar
with those weak and ridiculous arguments. The point here is that gay sex is
described by Scripture not only as a sin, but as a perversion of the natural
design of the human body. And the larger point is that commandment breaking can
never be a part of the Christian community regardless of how many OSAS
hard-core dispensational guys preach that it can be. The view that Christ can
be your Savior even though He is not your Lord crawled up out of the sewers of
hell even if it did so through well-intentioned men. Dan’s endorsement of
same-sex relationships precludes him from the community of faith even if he
says that it does not.
In the end, due to Dan’s beliefs
and their implications for Christian doctrine and their impact on the Christian
community, we have to challenge his claim that he possesses genuine faith. Many
people came along in the first century church making the same claims. But upon
closer inspection, they were found out to be false teachers, false prophets,
and false converts. The same is not any less true today. The difference is that
today’s church hardly ever inspects a person’s claim to know Christ. They
simply take it at face value and conduct no due diligence whatsoever. We have
to be more prudent about how we conduct ourselves in the Christian community.
We don’t start out doubting a person’s faith. That is not what I am saying. I
am saying that new arrivals must be known. We spend time with them. We have
conversations with them. We observe their life. What do they believe and how do
they conduct themselves? When we begin to hear things that trouble us, we must
push into those issues and understand more about their claims and beliefs. When
we bump into guys like Dan, we engage in conversation and eventually end up
where we have ended up. We ask the person to repent of their unbelieving views,
submit to Scripture with all humility, and call on their elders to teach them a
more pure form of the Christian system. When they are persistent in their
refusal to accept and believe Christian dogma, we are equally persistent in refusing their testimony and view them as a wolf instead of a sheep. Those
facts are published for the rest of the community so that everyone is aware and
protected from those who would bring damnable heresies into the body of Christ.
When men like Dan collect other cavils of like-mind and run down the street to
start their own group, we treat them with contempt and shame, refusing to
extend the slightest degree of respect and honor to them because they reflect a
shameful and despicable version of Christianity that does far more harm than it
does good to the Christian way.
Don't take the pictures too seriously. They are mere my way of interjecting a little sarcasm, you know, a literary device not to be taken overly literal. 
