Carelessness in Scholarship

I have been reading a book entitled “Why We’re Not Emergent”, by Kevin DeYoung and Ted Kluck, and I am actually enthralled with the book. These two young guys, who should totally be into the emergent movement, are actually very into conservative orthodoxy.  The thing that stands out to me, though, is a passage they took from one Rob Bell, the author of “Velvet Elvis.”

In the passage, Bell basically sets out to challenge the necessity of the virgin birth.  He compares it to the mystery cults of Dionysus and Mithras, and basically is stating that whether or not Jesus was born of a virgin, isn’t his way still the best way to live?  Now, I agree with him that the Jesus Way is the best way, but let’s get serious here.  First of all, let’s all take a moment and really look at this mystery cult thing.  First, they were popular WAY after Christianity.  Second, let’s look at both Dionysus’ and Mithras’ birth accounts.  First, Dionysus was saved from his mother’s burning carcass by Zeus, who impregnated Semele the same way I impregnated my wife.  He sewed the child, wait for it, IN HIS THIGH, and the child gestated there.    And the parallelism is totally absent, by the way.  Dionysus was born of a mother and a god via intercourse.  Jesus was born of the virgin Mary by the Holy Spirit filling her.

Now, for Mithras.  Mithras emerged totally formed from a rock.  Yes, rocks are virgins in that they are not capable of intercourse, but come on!  This is ridiculous.  For someone who considers themselves to be a leader (well, emergent voices don’t consider themselves leaders at all, which is why some of them are screwy), you can’t go around speaking as a voice people respect when you yourself have not put enough scholarship into the matter to know for yourself.

Second, his casting aside the virgin birth obviously shows no knowledge of scripture.  Here’s the short of it:  God promised David an eternal throne for his descendents.  Jeconiah was the last king of Judah before the exile.  God through Jeremiah proclaimed that Jeconiah was to be marked as childless, and none of his seed would sit on the throne of Judah or Israel or anything else for that matter.  So, while Jeconiah’s bloodline still had legal claim to the throne, they never did possess it again.  Joseph was from this bloodline.  God used Mary, who was a descendent of David through his son Nathan, as Jesus’ mother and used Joseph as his adoptive father.  As legal firstborn of Joseph, Jesus was the rightful legal heir.  Without having Jeconiah’s blood in His veins, He qualified by God’s requirements to be King of Israel.  Besides, either Jesus was born of a virgin, or He was conceived out of wedlock.  Seeing as how Messiah was to be a sacrificial lamb, that wouldn’t work, because He would then be blemished.

I agree to some extent with Rob Bell.  Yes, Jesus’ way of life is a far preferred way, but you can’t throw out sound doctrine.  Truth and Grace are inseparable.

Apologetics Tidbit #3 or #4 or something

Okay, for all the redactors out there (Redactors think that the Torah is a product of the Babylonian Captivity), here’s a question.  Don’t you think that, considering the writer of the Torah used Egyptian names, was familiar with Egyptian geography, and basically spoke like an Egyptian in their description of the place settings, do you really think that it came from some numbskull 800 years after the fact?  It makes more sense to me to say yeah, this Moses guy wrote it considering that he is more plausible than some priestly redactors in the 500’s BC who wouldn’t even be familiar with some of the things of which Moses spoke, like ancient place names.  I don’t know, just a thought.

Somebody Knows You When You’re Down and Out

I love Eric Clapton. Not just a little. If I had been alive AND in Britain in the 60’s, I would have been one of the people who painted “Clapton is God” all over London. “Slowhand” is, without a doubt, one of the best guitarists to have ever lived and breathed.  I remember his “Unplugged” album (for those of you who may be too young to remember, the “Unplugged” idea was the sole decent contribution MTV ever made to western civilization) and I remember listening to it over and over.  One of my favorite songs from that album was “Nobody Knows You When You’re Down and Out.”  That song has always resonated with me.  It usually feels like nobody knows you or wants to help when you feel like you have hit rock bottom.

Moses had been out of the game for 40 years.  He was a shepherd, married to Zipporah, daughter of Jethro (no relation to the Beverly Hillbilly of the same name).  It’s not like he was a loser or anything, but he definitely was not in a position to be a leader, or spokesman, or, well, anything other than a shepherd.  The people of Israel were all in pretty much the same boat, only worse.  They were slaves in a foreign land.  If ever a group of people were “Down and Out,” it would be the Israelites and their shepherd Prophet.

The cool thing, though, is that they weren’t alone.  God “remembered” His people, and sent Moses to lead them out of Egypt.  A people, crushed, beaten and bruised, led by a man who had been out of commission for 40 years.  God didn’t just “remember” the Israelites, He founded a nation from them, and used Moses to lead them through the nascent stages.

God knows us in our strengths, and in our weaknesses.  He knows us in our success, and He knows us in our losses and failures.  He is the God who sees, the God who hears, and the God who provides.  If ever there is one who knows us in our downs and outs, it is this LORD ALMIGHTY.

When stuff sucks…really bad

Things sucked for Joseph.  His brothers sold him as a slave, his new Egyptian boss threw him in prison when the boss’ wife fell for Joseph, and he languished in a prison cell while the Pharoah’s butler hung out upstairs enjoying his old job.  It’s kind of hard at that point to say, ‘I know God is with me.’

The crazy thing is that HE was!!!  God was with Joseph every step of the way, through all the crap and suckiness.  Eventually, God blessed Joseph with a new job (Vice President of Egypt, yes, I’m sure it wasn’t called that, but we need something to relate to in today’s age), a wife, and two children that he named to reflect the differences in his life.  God provided for Joseph and used his brothers’ own evil intentions to save the lives of Jacob and his children, thus preserving the lineage of Israel.  I am sure there were times when Joseph hurt from the experience, and I think it would be appalling to not recognize the pain and suffering he went through, but it was all to demonstrate God’s love and mercy for those who love Him.

It’s hard to keep a healthy perspective in the middle of sorrows.  However, we must remember that, according to Romans 8, all things good and bad work together for the benefit of the believer of Jesus Christ.  Bad things are called bad things for a reason.  It’s because they are bad.  God, however, can use even the evil directed against us to edify us, prepare us, sustain us, and to bring glory to Him.  I am still amazed at Joseph’s gracious response to his brothers after Israel died.  That he could be so loving and accepting of his brethren can only mean one thing:  Joseph saw the Lord in his suffering and knew that all that passed was part of His eternal plan.

Apologetics Tidbit #3

Okay, there’s exactly three ways that people have agreed the earth could have come about.  One is that the universe is all an illusion.  Notice that no one who ever ascribes to this view ever walks into the street without looking.  Sounds great in some ashram somewhere, or if you are doing LSD, but not too applicable in the real world.  Another is that the universe is eternal.  Sounds good, but…

If that were the case, due to the laws of thermodynamics and the law of entropy, the universe would be barren due to heat loss an eternity ago.  Basically , that leaves only one other solution, and it is that the universe had a finite beginning.  If it did, it had to have a cause greater than itself.  A creator is pretty much the only answer.  Sorry, naturalists.  Maybe Stephen Hawking can come up with another entertaining “super-duper-string multiverse theory of all that is” so that you can entertain the idea of there being no God.  See, evolutionists believe in an endless string of infinitely impossible chances, whereas ID supporters believe that there need only be one tiny leap of faith in the direction of a creator which makes things fall into place.  He even gave us science to study His universe ’cause He’s rational and since we were created in His image, we are too.  I guess He thought we might enjoy that.

Faithfulness and Covenant Love

Abram was a very faithful guy.  More faithful than I probably would be.  God told him to get up, leave home, move somewhere he had never been, and that God would give him that land.  In Genesis 15, we read about the covenant made between God and Abraham.

A description of a covenant ceremony is in order.  Basically, this is what happens.  The two covenant parties would cut several animals (in this case, a heifer, a goat, and a ram, each three years old, a dove and a pigeon) in half lengthwise, lay the two halves on a path, and walk between the two lines of animal halves.  The two parties agree that what happened to the two animals would happen to them if they failed to fulfill the oath.  Then, you’re done.

So, what happens with God and Abram?  God causes Abram to fall asleep, where He reveals more to him about his destiny.  But He also keeps Abram asleep until the right time.  Then, just as Abram woke, He saw a firepot with a blazing torch passing between the animals.

What that means is this:  God had created a unilateral covenant with Abraham.  God was in effect saying, “The burden of keeping this covenant is upon Me.”  God was giving His oath that He would be faithful to the terms of the covenant even despite the faithlessness of those whom He made a covenant with.

Let this be a reminder to us all that God’s promises are rock solid.  They are there for us, and He will always prove faithful to us.

Capital Punishment

For those who read the story of Noah, one cannot help but read the passage at the end of the story where God demands an accounting for the life of his fellow man.  Reading the passage, you see that in essence, God was deeming capital punishment not just permissible, but expected.  Why would a loving, kind God, who is our Beloved Father, not just allow, not just condone, but demand the life of a murderer?

The simple answer is this:  We are made in the image of God Himself.  To allow someone to take the life of another person, who was made in God’s image would be tantamount to defiling Himself.  Humanity is special in God’s eyes, and to allow people to wantonly take another person’s life would be to treat God with disdain.

If you read through the bible, you will notice that murderers and criminals were condemned to die, and the elderly and infant (the least capable of defending themselves) were to be protected at all costs.  In today’s world, the liberalist agenda has reversed those orders.  Criminals and murderers are receiving more and more protection from the system.  In contrast, men like Jack Kevorkian are taking lives and promoting “euthanasia.”  Our president-elect has made it very clear that he is supportive of abortion and would work to further abortion rights in America.  If there is any more telling evidence that our nation and our world is heading in the wrong direction from that desired by Holy GOD, I would be shocked.

I realize that God’s way is not the most popular way.  It just happens to be the right way.

Apologetics Tidbit #2

Okay, this time I am not delving so much into science.  Instead, lets look at history and mythology.  Why?  Well, first of all, nearly every culture on earth has a flood myth, which lends credence to the idea that there was a cataclysmic flood.  Otherwise, there would be no reason to believe that only Moses knew about it.  The fact that every culture has a flood story means that it is in the collective consciousness of nearly every culture, which means that it probably happened.  Now, to differentiate between some of them, the Hebrew version is the only one that seems plausible.  The most common example to refute the Bible is the Gilgamesh epic.  A couple problems, though.  First, Gilgamesh was told to build a boat that would dwarf the ark in only seven days.  Also, it took only seven days to flood the earth, and another seven to dry.  Another problem is that the boat shape of Gilgamesh’s ark was a giant box.  It wouldn’t last long in a real flood, as there would be no steering and it would not glide in the water.  It would have been capsized at some point.  Noah’s ark was a far superior design, and the time period was long enough that a horrible cataclysmic flood would not be impossible under that time frame.

God and mercy

God had every reason in the world to kill every airbreather on earth.  Mankind had decided, not unlike today, that they would rather be their own gods than to worship the true God.  God found only one man on all the earth that loved Him, and He saved him and his family from destruction.  God had every reason in the world to destroy humanity completely, but because of the faithfulness of one man, he did not.  He saved him, his family, and all the animals of the world.

A common refrain today is that God is different from the way he was in the Old Testament.  There are enough episodes of His mercy to humankind and His steadfast love even in the face of rejection in the Tanakh that prove otherwise.  To be faithful to lovingly preserve His creation for the sake of one man is evidence enough of His mercy.

Apologetics mini-niblet #1

I want to hand out little tidbits of apologetics knowledge to give everyone out there a little morsel to defend the faith with, or for those who don’t believe, a little food for thought.

If Darwin and the evolutionists were right, then the fossil record for the species of the earth would bear out in a tree, with a big trunk way back in time symbolizing our single-cell ancestor, and then tree branches giving way to each of the major phyla of animals.  Unfortunately for Richard Dawkins and the Atheism Crew, the fossil record looks like a bar code:  every major animal phyla appeared almost instantaneously in the Cambrian period of earth’s history.  If you want to know more, check out the Cambrian Explosion for more information.