One of the fundamental pieces of the Christian religion is the Bible. Sure, on its face, the fundamental piece is a relationship with Jesus Christ. I mean, what else would "Christ-ian" mean? But if you take away the Bible, what do you know about Christ? Practically zero. Thus the Bible is key to Christianity. It is so key that for most of church history the Bible has been understood to be "God-breathed." That is, the Bible is the Word of God and, as such, should be taken with God's authority. Just a basic fact.
Of course, we're long beyond that now. We in the modern era have figured it out. The Bible is a nice book, as far as it goes, sure, but you can't take it too literally, of course. Jesus said He was "the door," but we don't understand that to mean that He had hinges and a door knob, right? So why would we understand, for instance, that when He said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life; no man comes to the Father but by Me" (John 14:6) He actually meant some kind of narrow-minded exclusivity like so many conservative Christians do today? No, of course He didn't. We don't take literally that God commanded the Israelites to annihilate the Amalekites (1 Sam 15:2-3) or that God actually struck Uzza dead (2 Sam 6:7) or the like. We know better today. The Bible isn't "that kind of book." It's ... spiritual. You can't read it like any regular book. You certainly can't assume your understanding of it is either correct or, worse, authoritative. It's a good book, but, look, can't we all just get along?
Under the guise of humility and acceptance, then, we gut God's Word. While we "embrace" the Bible, we deny its truthfulness, sufficiency, applicability, and reliability. By naming as truth the claim, "You cannot know for sure that you can correctly understand what the Bible is saying," we undercut all of God's Word and, with it, all of Christianity. The ever popular "That book was written by men and is not completely reliable" or "What answers does a book written 2,000 years ago have for 21st century questions?" notions leave us without ... Christ. When we call it immoral to say, "The Bible is God's Word and God's Word says ...," we are declaring God unreliable, the Holy Spirit incompetent, and Jesus a liar. "There's the truly humble Christian viewpoint."
Here's what they're telling you. You cannot know for absolute certainty, so, therefore, you cannot know. This is, of course, nonsense because, as any philosopher will tell you, you cannot know with absolute certainty anything. Some uncertainty about something doesn't negate knowing. It's also nonsense because while you cannot know for absolute certainty, they apparently do. "Oh, you say that the Bible teaches that homosexual behavior is a sin? You cannot know that for certain. We, therefore, affirm with confidence that it is not." Something like that. They affirm with certainty that "The Bible doesn't mean what you think it means" while affirming that you cannot know. They will argue, "Well, if Christians throughout the ages have never been able to figure it out, you surely can't." This is utter nonsense. Christians throughout the ages have figured these questions out. It's not that they didn't; it's that they haven't gotten unanimous agreement ... from the world. Which is, of course, what you would expect. The existence of a dispute doesn't mean the answer isn't present; it simply means that not all sides accept it. So anti-Christian forces often bearing pro-Christian names are at war with the Bible, God's Word.
Jesus said, "You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free" (John 8:32). Modern "thinkers" say, "Well, no, you won't. We can't actually know the truth." And not knowing will certainly not set you free. Interestingly, Jesus specified the truth they would know that would set them free. "If you abide in My word, you are truly My disciples" (John 8:31). Well-meaning folks have opted to deny that God's Word can be known or trusted, thus denying Christ Himself ... all while calling themselves "Christians" -- so-called followers of Christ who have no problem standing against God's written word and campaigning to get others to toss out the reliable and authoritative word of the Omniscient God. Doesn't even make sense. So don't let that be you.
4 comments:
Stan,
I got an insane comment regarding this post in my moderation folder recently. Apparently, Christianity is 100% responsible for the trans Atlantic slave trade and when it's convenient we can simply ignore the fact that slavery pre dates Christianity, and it's still going strong even after Christians led the way to it's abolition in Western culture. If one looks at the history of slavery it seems impossible to ignore the role of a certain other religion in both the trans Atlantic slave trade, but in the continuing existence of slavery in modern society.
Of course that's assuming a rational, unbiased look at history.
I don't know what "the reliability of God's Word" has to do with 18th-century slavery practices or how "Bad people did bad things in the name of religion" is viewed as a substantive argument against a reliable God and His Word, but, hey, you take what you can get, I guess. Oddly, I guess I'm supposed to conclude that I should take these non-arguments from non-believers (at least non-believers in anything resembling traditional, historical, biblical Christianity) should provide a more reliable basis for Christendom than anything that ever existed before (including the Bible).
I suspect it's because there really isn't a coherent argument against the point of your post, so all that's left is to put forth arguments that don't actually argue against your post.
Because ignoring the fact that Christians led the charge to abolish slavery, while other religions continue to embrace it, certainly disproves your point about the Bible being our most reliable source for information about God.
Among those who make the argument against Scripture that you're presenting is one who is certain the Holy Spirit has enlightened him as to the "truth" about things like homosexuality, women preachers and other things. It's pretty ironic that a book I am said to worship over the God of Whom the book informs us is where this fellow learned there even is such a thing as a Holy Spirit. Another likes to speak of God's Word being written on our hearts...including the hearts of those not informed of Jesus... and as such this affirms for him that he'd be and/or act no differently if he wasn't raised in a culture immersed in and informed by Scripture. That's quite a stretch in my view. It's presumes much that can't possibly be supported, and likely counter to what evidence of human nature there is.
It's all convenience, and a far truer example of a cherry-picking mentality toward the faith than anything found among "fundies" or Evangelicals.
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