"God??????"

Recently I came across an article in USA Today that discussed the findings of a new book concerning how Americans view and understand God. The article did not deal with epistemological method as much as it did the simple results of the research. According to the research, there are four dominant views of God and then there is the atheistic view which makes up about 5% of the population. The purpose of this article is not to get into the details of these views. Rather, it is the objective of this article to discuss our basis for knowing and understanding God. One should not race to the question, “What kind of God exists?” without also asking the question, “How can I know what kind of God exists?”
To what do people point when asked the question, “How do you know what kind of God exists?” If God exists, and it is my contention that He does, then the question we must ask is “what is God like?” and “how do we know?” After all, not just any kind of God exists. When we say that God exists, implicit in that statement is a very specific kind of God! For example, we would deny that any kind of God exists who ordered Muslim terrorists to attack the World Trade Towers on September 11th, 2001. But is this denial based on something outside of our own desires and projections of God or is it based on tangible information we have about the God that actually exists? And if the answer to this

What does God think about life issues? Is God like a grey-haired grandpa we remember from our childhood? Or is He a stern disciplinarian who smashes us over the head every time we fail? Is God a soft-spoken father who indulges our every adolescent desire? How do we arrive at the truth about what God is like? This understanding of God shapes, to a very large degree, how we conduct our lives day in and day out. Our view of the kind of God that is shapes how we make decisions, how we think, how we relate to others, and numerous other behaviors that make us who we are as a person. Fundamentally, either we are informed by God of who He is, or we engineer and create a god of our own choosing.

The truth about our views of God

In many instances, the truth is that our tableau of God is nothing more than our own projections or desires of who we want God to be in our own heart. There is a real struggle in the heart of the sinner to create views of God that satisfy or are amenable to our sin nature. The human heart cannot be trusted to arrive at a view of God on its own. (Jer. 17:9) It is woefully inadequate to construct an accurate view of the God that is. (1 Cor. 2:14) The first chapter to the Roman Church describes this inadequacy clearer than any other passage of Scripture in the entire Bible. Since human beings are creations that come into existence without any prior knowledge of reality, everything we see in that reality is subject to our interpretation. In other words, we are knowledge dependent. Our knowledge of reality depends on something outside of ourselves. Even innate knowledge is dependent on the Depositor of the knowledge that is planted within from the start. We are not at liberty to create our own reality, much less to create a God of our own making. In and of ourselves, we are not capable of arriving at true knowledge nor can we be trusted to arrive at true knowledge even if the capability were there somehow. Epistemologically, we quickly hit a dead-end when we encounter reality. Our knowledge begins and ends with the Divine Trinity. Outside of God there is no hope for human knowledge. The question is really one of authority more than anything else. What is the ground upon which our knowledge rests?

You will have no other gods

What exactly does this commandment mean? The question about how this verse should be translated concerns exclusivity or hierarchy. Is God saying that you are not to have any god higher than me? Or is He saying, you are to have no God other than me? The linguistic evidence points to an idiomatic sense that favors the latter. We are commanded to have no other God other than God. Prior to this commandment, in the prologue, God identifies Himself. In other words, God gives a clear identification of who He is and then commands unwavering commitment to Himself as the only God the Children of Israel is to worship and serve. God requires complete, comprehensive, and unconditional allegiance to Himself. God rejects half-worship as Idolatry. We are not at liberty to hold back that which we desire and give to God only that which we find convenient. Anything less than complete loyalty is not loyalty. God rejects partial service as iniquity. God is indentified by His nature and His nature is seen in His actions. We know and understand God from the actions He undertakes in Scripture. These actions include speech-acts as well as divine interventions in the narrative of biblical history.

When we know it all

When human beings follow in the foot-steps of Descartes, and man becomes the measure of all things, all hope for true knowledge about God vanishes. We end up with as many gods as there are human desires and projections. Rather than being an essential key to human knowledge, Cartesian philosophy becomes antithetical to it. As a result, humans continue to do what they have done since the fall: they create projections of gods so that they may be free to satisfy their innate desire to worship something while at the same time, in essence, worshipping self. In other words, when man creates various gods to worship, he is really seeking to have his cake and eat it too. This way, man is only as accountable as he wants to be and not one inch more. He retains the sins he so cherishes, and condemns those behaviors he himself hates. And since some of those condemned behaviors are also condemned by God, he comes away with a sense of righteousness in his own mind. For instance, this frees contemporary western culture to accept homosexuality while at the same time holding the practice of moral judging in great contempt. Man becomes the measure of all things which is really what the history of the Garden of Eden demonstrates to us from the start. Our struggle, really, when all is said and done, is either to worship God or to be god. That is what the sinful nature, at bottom, is really after. Either we will submit to God or god will submit to us. This ethical component of epistemology is often missed by many. However, to do so is detrimental to the conversation about knowing what kind of God actually exists. For in back of the question of knowing God is the question concerning how we know what kind of God exists.

Justifying the kind of God that exists

The one component that is sometimes missing in this discussion about knowledge of the kind of God that really exists is the ethical aspect of the question. If we were to ask if we have the right to believe whatever we wish about another person, the answer would be categorically, no! If we arrive at a certain belief about someone or something, that belief must be justified. Such justification is reasonable and we see it practiced and expect that it ought to be practiced every time we engage in such behavior. In fact, we find it unreasonable to make baseless and unjustifiable conclusions about other people. This is true in secular society and it is especially true in Christianity. John Frame writes,

“To ask a person to justify a belief is to ask an ethical question. It is to ask what ethical right that person has to believe such and such; it is to ask whether and why we are ethically obligated to believe it.” [Frame, The Doctrine of the Knowledge of God, 109]

 This relates well to our discussion on the question of what kind of God exists. In the end, we all form beliefs around the kind of God that really is. Frame also discusses the fact that belief is a human behavior and as such, must be subjected to an ethical evaluation. And here is the rub. In post-modern society, there is a real struggle to agree on the normative standards. There is an attempt to free ourselves from being slaves to any tradition or system of thought that we find inordinately oppressive. Christianity would be classified as one of those systems, and therefore, so too would any normative view of God, and epistemology for that matter. Each person ought to be free to believe whatever they wish. After all, a denial of normative ethics would logically force one to that conclusion. But we really do believe in ethical norms as a society despite post-modernism’s strangle hold on many of these arguments. We argue one way and live quite another. And we insist that no one view of God is superior to any other view of God. Such thinking is normative. The question is, “does this thinking comport with reality and is it coherent?” The short answer is no, but the purpose of this article is focused elsewhere.

Knowing the kind of God that is

The source for all knowledge of God is revelation. This is how we know that God exists and it is the only way to know what kind of God exists. The sin nature of man naturally suppresses true knowledge of God and exchanges the true image of God described in Scripture for an image that is acceptable to the sin nature. This god excuses the sinful behavior and desires of the man who created it. And there are nearly as many of these creations (projections) of god as there are humans.

The Christian is not insulated from such behavior even though the believer has a very distinct advantage having had their eyes opened to the truth of God revealed in Scripture. Nevertheless, due to the fact that we still have a sin nature to contend with, we also have to be on alert for this behavior to pervert the image of God as well. We have our pet sins, our system of ethics that sometimes contradicts God’s moral law and we must guard against the temptation to avoid excusing what God does not excuse. God is not a soft-spoken grandpa in the sky who brings us toys every time he visits. Jesus said, “You hypocrites, rightly did Isaiah prophesy of you: This people draws near to me with their lips, but their heart is far away from me. But in vain they do worship me, teaching as doctrines the precepts of men.” Matt. 15:7-9 It is strange how much of God and of Christ we fail to see in Scripture when we adopt views of God that are based on post-modern thinking. This gives a clue just how deeply post-modern philosophy has infected Christian thinking in the twenty-first century. We begin with views of God that we desire to be there and then we read them into the text. Hence, the Christian thinker has a sinful tendency to project the god they want in the pages of Scripture. No less than fourteen times did Christ rebuke the religious of his day, calling them hypocrites for refusing to submit to God’s revealed will while at the same time professing to be the exemplars of God in the earth. These religious men of Christ’s time were guilty of creating images of God in their minds that were not in accord with the true God is Israel. Consequently, Jesus could not tolerate their sin and he certainly did not excuse it. He blasted them with the fiery rebukes they deserved. The same can be seen all throughout the Old Testament in God’s dealings with Israel. In His dealings with Israel’s wanderings, God says, “I will chastise them in accordance with the proclamation to their assembly. Woe to them, for they have strayed from Me! Destruction is theirs, for they have rebelled against Me. Hosea 7:12c-13 This is one example of how our view of God and Scripture’s depiction of God are remarkably different. In fact, these two views of God are actually antithetical to one another. However, we should be encouraged when we fall into God’s discipline for this is an indication that we are indeed sons. If we are not subjected to God’s holy discipline, then we must question whether or not we are sons. Heb. 12:3-11

Our views of God must be informed by the only reliable source of the kind of God that exists. And that source is Scripture. To Scripture we must come if we are to arrive at an adequate, albeit incomplete understanding of the God that is. The only other choice is to worship our own projection of god. And to engage in such a practice is a reflection of pride, arrogance, and an autonomous desire that runs counter to everything that God is. The Scripture is there to show us the way. The Word of God is God speaking. God speaks about His nature, His will, His desire, and He speaks about how we should live, love, think, decide, and behave in every situation we may find ourselves in.

If it is our hope to live a life that is pleasing to God, we must know what kind of God He is. If we miss the mark on knowing the kind of God that is, we have no basis for understanding how we should then conduct ourselves in this world. To please God, our lives must be patterned after Him. We cannot possibly know how to pattern our lives after God if we do not know what kind of God He is. In order to understand the kind of God that is, we must turn to Scripture and humbly submit our thinking about, and interpretations of God, to the Word of God and allow God’s revelation to inform us of His person. In other words, we must interpret God according to God's own interpretation of Himself.

On Sabbatical

I am taking a brief sabbatical from writing to recharge my batteries, reflect on my life, and refresh my relationship with my heavenly Father. God willing, I will return to blogging sometime this fall.

"Take hold of instruction; do not let go. Guard her, for she is your life." Prov. 4:13

Worth Repeating

By: Kevin Vanhoozer

Triune Authorship [Remythologizing Theology]

Only God can make God known. Moreover, we could know nothing of God or his purposes at all if God were not a speech agent, for only speaking disambiguates behavior: "Incorporeal agents who do not speak are like invisible men who are dumb." There would be an obvious gap in a form of theism in which God, having made a world of rational creatures able to love and worship him, did not in any way communicate with them. Christian theology begins in the wake of God's communicative activity or theodrama (drao = "I do") in which God's speaking is a doing and God's doing is more often than not a matter of speaking.

The proper starting point for doctrine of God is thus the biblical depiction of God as a speaking subject whose breathed ("Spirited") voice is expressed supremely in the christological Word made flesh and secondarily in the canonical polyphony that in turn presents Jesus Christ. God thus makes himself known as a triune communicative agent, and what he communicates is not merely information (truth) but energy (life) and purpose (the way) - in a word, himself: the Word made flesh, Jesus Christ. The Bible is a product of God's triune communcative work and that not only transmits information but also, and more importantly, conveys life.

The Bible's depiction of God is more than a projection of the best human thoughts about the divine. The Bible is the means whereby God projects his own voice onto the stage of world history.

Independence Day - Celebrating Spiritual Liberation

In a couple of days, the USA will celebrate her independence from English oppression. There will be family, picnics, fireworks, and people will surround themselves with those whom they love and with those who love them. And this is as it should be. But Christians have an advantage. We can celebrate our spiritual independence from the bondage of slavery to sin each and every day of our lives. Paul said that if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; old things passed away; behold new things have come (2 Cor. 5:17). I thank my God that He has rescued me from the perishing. Even though I did not deserve it, he called me to himself in a display of love and mercy that is incomprehensible. And even though I have had many blunders along the way, he rescuses me from myself each and every day. Scripture says, Great are Your mercies, O Lord; revive me according to Your ordinance (Ps. 119:156). But we falter and we stumble all the time. Paul said that this one thing he does; I forget those things which are behind me, and I press forward toward the prize of the upward call of God. Let us have this attitude as we celebrate our spiritual liberation, and if we have any other attitude, may God reveal that to us so that we may subject our thoughts to the only wise God, our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ.
Think on things that are true, honorable, right, pure, lovely, and of good repute, so long as there is excellence and praise worthiness there. Let us each receive one another in Christian love until we prove that we are not what we say we are. And that proof comes by our daily living in the here and now. Let us not condemn one another based on hearsay from others, especially if the credibiliy and objectivity of the other is already suspect. Satan is a grand deceiver and he will do whatever he has to do in order to rob us of our unity, our love, and common bond. Let us put away ungodly practices of lying, gossip, and hateful speech, and rush to the aid of those in need. This should be a season of celebration, not only for the temporal, but also for the spiritual. May God reward us according to our deeds, and may He judge us in the very same manner in which we judge others!

Happy Independence day!

Emergents, Mysticism, and Postmodernism

The philosophical influences of postmodernism have fundamentally affected the epistemology, metaphysic, and ethic of the EC movement in numerous ways that will in turn seriously shape its hermeneutical methodology. Epistemologically, the EC movement has clearly abandoned a distinctly Christian theory of knowledge. There is no mention of arriving at how things really are through faith, which is grounded in the historical event and person of Jesus Christ. Rather there is an emphasis on the mystical encounter of God through human consciousness, as though human consciousness can be trusted as a reliable source for intimate knowledge of God, or even a legitimate religious experience for that matter. John Frame writes,


"The Christian knows by faith that this world is not of his own making, that there is a “real world” – a world of facts – that exists apart from our interpretation of it...What prevents us from constructing an absolutely crazy world? Only our faith. Only our faith assures us that there is a “real world” that exists apart from our interpretation. Only God’s revelation provides us with a sure knowledge of that world and so serves to check our fantasies.”

The only justification we have for claiming to possess true knowledge, is that we know by faith through God’s revelation. We interpret the facts of God’s world according to his interpretation of the facts of that world. If the EC movement denies to Scripture the status of God’s inerrant revelation, it follows that some theory of knowledge must take its place. A Christian theory of knowledge humbly submits itself to divine revelation. It does not reject it in favor of unaided human reason or an unjustified reliance and overconfidence in human consciousness. Greg Bahnsen writes,

“The word of the Lord is self-attestingly true and authoritative. It is the criterion we must use in judging all other words. Thus, God’s word is unassailable. It must be the rock-bottom foundation of our thinking and living (Matt. 7:24-25). It is our presuppositional starting-point. All our reasoning must be subordinated to God’s word, for no man is in a position to reply against it (Rom. 9:20) and any who contend with God will end up having to answer (Job 40:1-5).”

If the sole authority for knowledge is not the self-attesting Word of God, then it must rest elsewhere. Moreover, if that ‘elsewhere’ is either the human mind or human consciousness, as the EC movement contends, then the question becomes which human mind, or which human consciousness serves as the norm? There can be only one starting point and one ending point to arrive at absolute truth. That point must begin and end with the triune God who has revealed himself in the person of Jesus Christ through sacred Scripture. This is because the source of all created reality is God. Human beings are not the source of reality, and therefore, cannot serve as the final authority for how we know facts about that reality. Every other theory of knowledge, reality, and ethics proves to be considerably deficient. These voices are simply multiple iterations of the voice of autonomy as it cries out in the streets looking to seduce its next victim. The only safety from this creature is found in the objective truths that are the acts of God speaking to us in the person of Christ through the medium of Scripture as his Spirit graciously illumines our darkened minds to understand.

Text, Telos, and Transformation

Some scholars may label much of what has been discussed thus far as naïve realism. Certainly, that label may appear to stick in some minds. However, I contend that far from being a naïve realism borne out of modernistic philosophy, it is Christian realism that I am getting at. It is simple because it is common to the common, yet it is anything but simplistic. There is nothing naïve about taking God at his word. At the same time, it is important to point out that sin has complicated the discipline of interpretation just as it has every thing else it has touched. Moreover, human communication has obstacles that it otherwise would not have had. Hermeneutics is about overcoming these obstacles so that we may enjoy the rich blessings of divine and human relations.

A text is an organized set of signs and symbols designed in order to convey meaningful information with an end-state in mind. The end-state may simply be to tell a story for the purpose of entertainment. It may be to report on the state of affairs of the current North Korean crisis. It could be to publish the results of an investigation around the British Petroleum oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Hence, a text inherently has been designed by an author for the purpose of a specific goal. That is to say that the author had a definite purpose in mind when she put pen to paper. The author does not simply wish to inform of this or that matter. The author hopes for some change in the reader. The extent of this desired change is dependent on the author. The desired change may be very small. An author may write an entertaining story in order to provoke love or fear in the reader as they enter the world of fantasy. On the other hand, the author may be making a promise in hopes that the reader believes him, and acts on the information because the author can be trusted to keep his word. There are three components in communication that must be understood if hermeneutics is to be given the respect and attention it is due. This is especially true for biblical hermeneutics.

First, the author uses locution in order to construct his text. Locution is simply a word, phrase, or expression. However, that word phrase or expression can be classified by what it is doing. For example, “get off the lawn” is the locution by which I issue the illocutionary effect of a command. This is related to the author’s intention for uttering the phrase in the first place. The author intends to issue a stern order to the recipient to get off his grass. Finally, and ultimately, the author wishes to produce change in the hearer/reader. The author hopes the recipient will relocate off his grass. This last piece is the intended effect the author is looking for. The author hopes for a change in the hearer/reader. This change is called the perlocutionary effect. This is what Paul is getting at in Romans 12:2 when he uses the phrase “be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” The transformation means to change inwardly in fundamental character or condition. This transformation is indelibly connected with the renewing of the mind. The idea of the renewing of the mind means, to cause something to become new and different, with the implication of becoming superior. It is used only here and Titus 3:5. This renewal of the mind is a renewal of critical judgment in terms of the will of God. One now lives with the new orientation that has come with the new birth.

With the undoing of authorial meaning, or intent, and the death of the author, this perlocutionary effect fades into a cloud of extreme relativism. Hirsch points this out when he says, “There is no magic land of meaning outside human consciousness. Whenever meaning is connected to words, a person is making the connection, and the particular meanings he lends to them are never the only legitimate ones under the norms and conventions of his language.” If meaning is borne in human consciousness, with it comes telos and with telos comes objective meaning. The goal of hermeneutics is to get at that objective meaning by utilizing the rules inherent in language. These rules are borne out of the rational aspects of the human mind. As such, they are not arbitrary conventions, engineered by human culture. They have their source in the Divine Engineer and Creator of all things human, the triune God. This fact provides hermeneutics with the necessary foundation it requires in order to function. Without this foundation, hermeneutics ceases to be hermeneutics. The whole concept of interpretation requires a meaning out there somewhere to be discovered. Otherwise, what is the point of engaging in a practice that has no hope of discovering what is there? The alternative is that the only thing we can ever hope to get at is what is here. With this, all hope for change evanesces. When we say out there, we do not intend to imply anywhere. The there to which we refer is a definite, fixed place. It is in the intent of the author that the there is actually located. Thus, the hermeneutical journey is a journey toward the center of authorial intent, to include an eye on the perlocutionary hopes found in authorial intention. After all, readers have a purpose for reading the same as authors have a purpose for writing. The two horizons inevitably meet and with the fusion of these horizons, something changes. The question is; does the text transform the reader or the reader the text?

As Thiselton rightly points out, “The phrase “transforming texts” can be interpreted in two ways. Texts can actively shape and transform the perceptions, understanding, and actions of readers and of reading communities…But texts can also suffer transformation at the hands of readers and reading communities.” This awareness must never be underestimated in the practice of biblical interpretation. The sin nature must always be in view as we seek to better understand the meaning of God’s word. In his book, Theological Hermeneutics, Alexander Jensen argues along the same lines. He writes,

“The theologian needs to keep in mind that his or her hermeneutical approach, both in biblical and wider theological hermeneutics, is informed, if not determined by certain fundamental theological decisions…It is therefore important for the theologian to be aware of his or her presuppositions, and wherever possible, make them explicit, reflect on them and where appropriate, criticize them.”

Most often, we transform texts that threaten us. What is the threat we feel from a text that causes us to engage in this transforming activity? Quite simply, the text threatens to transform us. We encounter the text as an enemy who threatens our way of life. It is here that the word of God does its best work in our lifestyle. The text causes moderate to serious discomfort because it confronts us with the truth about our state and actions. In short, the text threatens our autonomy. It seeks to subdue that part of our living, and thinking that has yet to be subdued in Christ. We refer to this progressive activity as ‘progressive sanctification.’ As these two horizons fuse, something must change. When hot air and cold air meet under the right conditions, a tornado is the result. When God’s horizon fuses with our understanding, a tornado is produced. Either we will destroy the text (in our minds), or the text will destroy the unbiblical thinking that has invaded our mind through sin. This is the process Paul described in Romans 12:1-2 as I mentioned above. Transformation will take place when the two horizons meet. The only question concerns the object of transformation.

Necessary Preconditions of Hermeneutics

[I have posted an excerpt from my Th.D dissertation - in progress]

Transcendent Otherness and Authority


One of the consequences of the Renaissance was the displacement of tradition and authority. However, it soon became apparent that the displacement of authority was problematic for ethics and morality, and something had to be done to answer the question. The answer was a turn to the “Book of Nature.” Man needed something that was acceptable to modern views. An alternative that did not offend the new self had to be presented. The “Book of Nature” was man’s way of seeing the design of the Creator in reality and hence a reflection of moral perfection that was desperately needed for self-control. This turn was of course, not the right course of action, but the need for authority was self-evident. Roger Lundin writes,

“The “Book of Nature” was meant to resolve the “problem of many authorities” by providing incontrovertible evidence of the designs of God.”

However, with the romantic epistemology of the self, in which the world was nothing more than a mirror or a projection of the self, the power of the “Book of Nature” lost its authority. Without authority, the goal of hermeneutics dissolves. Lundin comments further,

“With nature drained of moral significance and the locus of meaning shifted so dramatically to the self, the “problem of many authorities became in the romantic tradition the “problem of endless authorities.” In a radically Protestant world, “every being” became not only its own “father, creator, and destroying angel,” but also its own pope and authoritative interpreter.”

The otherness and authority of the text is essential for meaningful hermeneutics. Without these, hermeneutics becomes a subjective exercise with as many authorities as there are interpreters. In other words, norms evaporate into radical subjectivism and extreme individualism. With this, we witness the death of God and metaphysics. The self becomes the measure of all things and for each self there is a different measure. Meaning dies an agonizing death and communication is like a ship at sea without a compass or a map. It does not navigate to where it ought to go; rather it ought to go wherever it navigates. If the goal of hermeneutics is transformation, then change remains a presupposition for engaging in the discipline. Otherwise, what is the point? Some travelers on this journey would contend that hermeneutics is merely about understanding. However, that merely begs the question of why understanding is so important in the first place. We seek to understand, not merely for the sake of understanding, but so that we may be moved, affected, or changed on the other side of that understanding. In other words, we seek the difference in life that understanding promises. The degree of transformation that understanding engenders, depends on the nature of the communication we are engaging and interpreting. Nevertheless, without the transcendent other, change becomes an exercise of pure subjectivism. Not only is there no compelling reason for change to begin with, there is no way to know if change is really for the better. One person’s projection of heaven is another person’s projection of hell. Who is say? Whose projection is best? In addition, who is to say if we are actually in heaven or hell, or some place else as far as it goes? Without otherness and authority, there is really no way to tell.

[Taken from: The Evolution of Jesus: Hermeneutical Foundations of the Emergent Church - A Case Study for Presuppositional Hermeneutics]

Evangelical Feminism and Christianity

Feminism and Christianity, some would argue go hand in hand. On the other hand, others would contend that the two are like trying to mix oil and water. Proponents would suggest that the feminist movement is about freedom from oppression and so too is Christianity. Opponents of the feminist movement would argue that feminism is a radical manifestation of female autonomy and as such is just one more act of idolatry. Both camps have very distinct methods by which they arrive at an understanding of what Scripture teaches on the subject. In fact, both employ, to one degree or another, the use of Scripture as support for the truthfulness of their view.

This article will treat the issues related to the distinctions of feminist hermeneutics and how this movement approaches the text of Scripture. Moreover, because of significant cultural intrusions into the Christian community, it is necessary to explore ways that we inadvertently and unwittingly embrace feminist theologies.

Feminist philosophy attempts to correct the problem of patriarchy and male oppression. Patriarchy is a form of social organization that places the father or the eldest male at the head of the family structure. It should be understood that most feminists consider patriarchy not just potentially oppressive to women, but ipso facto oppressive to women. Moreover, it should also be understood that a feminist is not necessarily a woman. It is anyone who adheres to the tenets of the feminist philosophy. In addition, feminists do not see themselves as wholesale rejecting the teachings of Scripture. They understand Scripture to teach a distinctly feminist theology. They are feminists because they understand that feminist philosophy best reflects the character of God. The only time Scripture departs from a feminist perspective is when the cultural biases of the men who pinned the words in that particular text emerge. Feminists like to have their cake and eat it too. Ann Loades comments

“Feminist interpretation is here understood as presupposing that the Bible is still read and heard and preached as an authoritative text in communities of belief and worship.”

It should be noted here that ‘authoritative’ does not necessarily mean authoritative in the sense of the traditional orthodox understanding of authoritative. Here is means that by using reason, imagination, historical insight, reflection on human experience and whatever other resources we can muster, the Bible somehow mediates to us a God who enables human beings to be most fully themselves. And therein lays the key to a feminist understanding of Scripture. God desires that women are enabled to be most fully themselves. It is difficult, in my opinion, to understand how a definition could be more porous than this one.

Feminism has certainly infected every area of philosophy, theology, society and politics in Western culture. Politically, women are encouraged by the likes of Simone de Beauvoir to try and improve their social and political position. Kate Millet argues that patriarchy is evident in every aspect of society. As such, women are not treated justly. Notice that patriarchy does not lead to unjust treatment of women, but rather it is unjust treatment of women. One feminist argues that “God’s original intention for women and men is that in work and in marriage they share tasks and share authority.” Gilbert Bileziken claims “that it would be natural to expect some indication of male authority in Genesis 1 if any existed, since Genesis 1 is a text that is permeated with the concept of hierarchical organization.” This is the classic case of looking for something implanted in the text merely on the grounds that the text itself seems to be attacking a favorite view. Since the text contradicts my understanding, it cannot be teaching what it appears to be teaching and therefore there must be an explanation that avoids contradiction and offense.

Even in the area of ethics feminism adopts a different emphasis. Carol Gilligan, in her book, “In a Different Voice,” writes, “When understood from a feminine perspective, ethics are grounded in the maintenance of interpersonal relationships. The feminist view of ethics emphasizes personal moral responsibility.”

In addition to this, Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza asserts that “women have special insight into truth and knowledge. Consequently, only women can interpret the Bible properly.” To those of us in a conservative church, having been immersed in a conservative tradition, these comments seem very eccentric. However, these views are migrating, more and more, into the mainstream of conservative evangelicalism. As genuine participants in the Christian community, we are obligated to recognize these shifts within our own ranks and as such, respond to counter all ungodly views and practices that threaten the believing community. Every predication that threatens truth is a threat to the faith community. Hence, not only does such a response require an understanding of the issues at hand, but it also requires a great deal of courage. We all just want to get along. However, in the Christian community, getting along requires the practice of purging the community of error and evil that often tends to move stealthily into its ranks. Thus that work is hard; it is dirty; and most often, it is unpleasant. We have been conditioned to avoid anything that is hard and unpleasant. So how do we proceed to purge ourselves of these ungodly cultural tendencies? First we must understand our roles and what they imply. Second, we must understand our value to our heavenly Father and each other. Next, we must know where to look for these attitudes in ourselves. Finally, we must be able to spot these attitudes in our neighbors and act accordingly. The rest of this article will deal with these four areas.

What do I mean by understanding our roles and the implication of those roles? In the beginning, God created man, male and female. He later reflected on that creation and said that it was very good. I cannot image a holy, perfect, loving Father, like God, being so satisfied with something, that He called it very good. When God created man and woman in the garden, he did so for his own glory. We came into existence by God, for God. We are here because he wanted us here. God is never does anything in a capricious or arbitrary style. He had a very specific purpose in mind for man and woman when he created them. We are to understand that purpose and respond to it positively. Man is created to serve and glorify God by being his authoritative leader. Woman is created to serve and glorify God through willful, gracious submission to the authority and leadership of the man. Paul instructed Timothy that he did not allow a woman to teach or exercise authority over man, but to remain quiet because Adam was created first, and then Eve (I Tim. 2:12-13). By referencing our first parents, Paul is pointing to an axiomatic universal structure. Man leads and is in the position of authority and the woman is to submit to that leadership.

What is our value to the Father and to one another? Being redeemed by the blood of Christ places great value on our worth in the eyes of our heavenly Father. However, it is only through Christ that this value comes. Outside of him, we are useless God-hating sinners worthy of death. Hebrews 12:5 says God only disciplines those He loves. God cares for our true well-being, as biblically defined. Since we are valued by God, we should also value one another. A husband values his wife by serving her, protecting her, keeping her home functioning, providing for her, making her feel secure in life’s basic needs. Neglect in these areas sends a woman the signal that you do not value her. A woman values her husband by honoring him, respecting him, and submitting to his leadership. If she challenges everything he does, she sends him the signal that she does not value him.

Where do feminist attitudes most appear? The feminist attitude in conservative churches appears in women that reject the biblical teaching on the roles of men and women ipso facto. A woman may freely criticize her pastor and reject his leadership. One should not understand this as simply differing with the pastor on something he preached from the pulpit. That happens from time and time and that alone is not refusal to submit to male leadership. However, going to the pastor and calling him on the carpet is another matter entirely. That is not her place. That is unequivocally contradictory to Paul’s command in I Tim. 2:12-13 and 1 Cor. 14:35. Women who reject this view of Scripture use all kinds of excuses for why they do so. Some women can be heard grumbling that those men, ‘the elders,’ are not God. They are just a bunch of fallen sinners the same as the rest of us. This is also asserted about the pastor and the husband. Some women think they only have to submit to their husband if he is meeting their personal standards of excellence. In other words, a husband has to earn their submission. While it is unquestionably true that a husband has clear mandates from God about loving and serving his wife, Scripture never places conditions on female submission to the male. These are just a few examples of how feminist philosophy appears in the Christian community. By trusting her husband, her pastor, and her elders to carry out their God-ordained roles, a woman honors God and submits to Him. By rejecting male leadership, a woman also rejects God. You cannot reject God’s word without rejecting God (Jn. 8:47)!

How do we when we see feminist philosophy in the faith community? We address it directly and without hesitation. It is a scandalous sin for a woman to put off the leadership of man. This is God’s ordained structure from the very foundation of creation. He created man and woman with specific roles that are equally designed to honor, serve, worship and glorify him. When feminist theology and philosophy infects our thinking to the point that we begin rejecting the sanctified order of God, it is time for repentance in humility and fear. We are to submit to each other and hold one another accountable to live godly lifestyles. When we see others within the Christian community wavering on the feminist issues, we have no choice but to speak with them in love, pulling them out of the flames of error.

Good News

Paul Tripp writes,

You cannot escape sin because it dwells within you. All the things you learn get twisted by its power. You can't outsmart it or buy your way out of it. You can't move to escape it. This is why the coming of the King is the best of news. Change is possible! You can stand amid the harshest realities of sin and have hope that will never disappoint you (Rom. 5:1-5). That marriage can change. That teenager can change. That church can change. That friendship can change. That bitterness can be put to death. That compulsion can be broken. That fear can be defeated. That stony heart can be made soft, and sweet words can come from a once-acid tongue. Loving service can come from a person who once was totally self-absorbed. people can have power without being corrupt. Homes can be places of safety, love, and healing. Change is possible because the King has come! [Tripp - Instruments in the Redeemer's Hands, pg. 6]

Notice that no where does Dr. Tripp assert that we can actually bring these profound changes about as a result of our own will power or intellectual capacity. The good news is that the King has come! He has arrived and because of this, we can have genuine hope. Jesus proclaims this glorious facts throughout the gospels, but Luke 4:18-19 records one of the most profound announcements in all of Scripture:

“THE SPIRIT OF THE LORD IS UPON ME, BECAUSE HE ANOINTED ME TO PREACH THE GOSPEL TO THE POOR. HE HAS SENT ME TO PROCLAIM RELEASE TO THE CAPTIVES, AND RECOVERY OF SIGHT TO THE BLIND, TO SET FREE THOSE WHO ARE OPPRESSED, 19 TO PROCLAIM THE FAVORABLE YEAR OF THE LORD.”

Now that we have this good news, the question is, 'what will we do with it?' Will we appropriate it into our lives? Will it become that which drives our thinking, our speaking, and our behavior? Will we believe it? And finally, will we share it with others? Will we share it with others by living it out in front of them AND by speaking this truth in love? Change has arrive because the King has come!

The Lost Message of Jesus - Steve Chalke

As I read more and more of Chalke's book, it seems clearer that he has an agenda that is clearly based on philosophical presuppostions from the start. At the core of Chalke's point seems to be the idea that Jesus came with a radical message that offended the established religious power of His day. It seems as if Chalke desires to compare Jesus' relationship to the religious powers of His time with the EC and the established church of our day. He seems to want to operate on the premise that it is good to radically depart from the established church simply for the sake of departing. One senses the method of Descartes and his orphan in Chalke's idea. Mind you that Chalke so far hasn't made a single attempt to make his case with Scripture. He simply points to Jesus' handling of situations, in particular His offenses of the established religious leaders and leaves one to believe that he thinks he has made his case. What Chakle fails to do is establish a valid connection between what the EC is attempting to do and what Jesus actually did. Moreover, Chalke fails to demonstrate just exactly how conservative evangelicalism is the modern parallel of the ancient legalism propogated by the Pharisees of Jesus' day. He simply wishes for us to take him at his word. For all we know, the EC could be the Gnostics of John's day and the established church could be the parallel of the apostolic church of John's day. After all, what is good for Chalke's subjective approach is equally good for my own subjective approach, is it not?

Commenting about Jonathan Edwards' sermons, Chalke says,

Commenting on Edwards' sermon, the academic Ola Winslow reflects, Two centuries and more later, this is still a grim sermon on the printed page and delivered to a packed auditory under the strain of 1741, it would have been almost unbearable.Preaching like Edwards' has been all too resentative of the portrayal of the gospel by the Church over the last few hundred years, and, by implication, of any popular understanding of the message of Jesus. [Chalke - The Lost Message of Jesus, pg. 56]

Chalke then proceeds to assert that love is "the very quality by which the New Testament defines him" [God]. No one who has ever read the Bible honestly and read Jonathan Edwards' sermon, "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" in light of the Scriptures, would ever condemn the sermon as a false portrayal of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Contrary to being unloving, it is one of the most profoundly loving sermons ever delivered to the church in modern times.

It seems quite clear that Chalke desires to substitute the image of God found in Scripture and preserved in the Christian tradition for thousands of years now for one that he and his partners find acceptable. And what "kind of god" is it that Chalke desires? Chalke discusses why Moses had to be hid in the cleft of the rock while God passed by. Typically it has been accepted that the reason was because no human could ever see God and live because of the aweome holiness and power of all that God is. But Chalke has a different take on this notion. He says,

"In Exodus 33, God is not hiding from Moses, but he is hiding the immeasurable suffering caused by that love. No-one could bear to see a face wrung with such infinite pain and live."

The idea is that God is so hurt and injured by man's rejection and man's own self-inflicted pain that God did not want Moses to see the pain in his own face because Moses would not be able to handle it. And so God hid Moses in order to spare Moses the awful experience of seeing all this pain in the face of God. Chalke wants a god who is more human than he is god. He wants a god who is more concerned with social causes and the liberation of the socially oppressed than He is with the truth or with the salvation of sinners from an eternal hell.  This theme continues to emerge as I make my way through the book. While I was hoping for a cogent, scholarly treatment of why the church has completely missed the point of Jesus' message, all I am seeing at this point is another preacher who rejects the biblical image of a sovereign, holy, God who judges sin and saves undeserving sinners for one who is the great social divine in the heavenlies who desires that we establish a socialist state here on earth, stamping out poverty and taring down the establishment of the privileged and the wealthy. At the end of the day, this seems to be the same old cloak we call "autonomy" with the latest fashion design attached to it.

The Lost Message of Jesus - Steve Chalke

The Masai

Chalke tells a story of Vincent Donovan, a Christian missionary working with the Masai in Tanzania, East Africa. It seems that the Masai believed in a god and that this god favored their tribe above all others. Donovan told them there was a High God above all others and that the Masai should consider leaving their tribe in order to search for this High God. After some time, a Masai elder broke the silence. He asked a very pointed question: Has your tribe found the High God? Have you known him? What an opportunity for Donovan to share the gospel of Jesus Christ! But is that what he did? Did he launch into a sermon similar to the one Paul preached to the Greek philsoophers at Mars Hill? Here is Donovan's answer:

"No, we have not found the High God. My tribe has not known him.For us, too, he is the unknown God. But we are searching for him...Let us search for him together. Maybe together we will find him." [Steve Chalke - The Lost Message of Jesus, pg. 23-24]

Chakle praises this response and claims that Donovan was freeing these people from their tribal view of their god. But in freeing them of this view, what did he provide them in exchange? Nothing! He addmitedly had nothing to offer them. For he too had not found God. Is this the message that Christ sends us out to proclaim? We are to go into all the world and release people from their tribal view of God? In the end, isn't it just as true that Donovon would have free the Masai from their tribal view of God by providing them with the biblical one? Rather than his agnostic approach, the exclusive gospel of Christ would have also moved them from their tribal view of God just the same. But Chalke doesn't seem to take that into account.