Category Archives: Commentary

Commentary

Mary explains how sinful humans can be rightly related to a holy God

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I recently wrote a post about the Bible’s teaching on why having correct beliefs about who Jesus was and what he did in history is necessary in order to be considered righteous by the God of the universe.

Mary wrote a comment in response that I am reproducing below.

Take it away, Mary.

 

 

Really good post, WK! This is an important question. And to be a good friend you need to answer it for your friend – gently, but clearly and honestly – because truth is more important to your friend’s wellbeing than their comfort. You’ve done this very ably here.

A few things I’d like to add:

Firstly, the questioner is coming with the assumption that there actually are such things as truly good people. This is a common assumption. The problem with it is that it makes light of the depravity of man and undervalues the holiness of God. We need to understand how perfect and pure God is. We need to understand how sinful and impure we are. The Bible tells us that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. This is confirmed for each of us by experience. Not only that, but our good works are as filthy rags to God. That sounds harsh, but we need to understand to what extent even our best actions are marred by depravity, by selfish motives. We have fallen not just a little bit short of God’s standard, but a lot. There is a vast chasm between us and God. The only thing we are deserving of is God’s judgment, God’s wrath. This is true of EVERYONE.

So the real question is really this: why does God let ANYONE into Heaven at all, rather than sending all of us to Hell? If it’s not because of our good works, then what is it?

The answer is that we go to Heaven because of Jesus’ good works. He is the only Person throughout the whole of history to live perfectly, to meet God’s standard. Because God loves these depraved, rebellious creatures that we are, Jesus comes to Earth, lives the perfect life which we don’t and then (astoundingly!) He takes the punishment which we deserve and gives us His righteousness. This is a magnificent gift with no equal. The Bible tells us that the wages of sin is death (so we’re in a bad way because all we’ve earned is death), BUT the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ (so God has offered us something we totally don’t deserve). Like any other gift it is offered but has to be accepted for it to be owned by the recipient. This is what is meant by “believing” – it is taking up that gift and placing one’s trust in Jesus’ work and not in our own work. It’s not about mere intellectual belief (although that is necessary), but about a relational belief. It’s about saying, “Jesus, I reject my own ability to be good enough and instead I accept Your gift of being good enough in my place. I place my trust in You. You have bought me with your own life and I belong to You”.

Does this mean that good works are unimportant? No. Here’s what is possibly one of the most well-known 2 verses in the Bible, Ephesians 2:8-9: “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God — not by works, so that no one can boast.” So it’s clear that salvation is by grace (God’s unmerited favour), NOT by works. But here’s the next verse, Ephesians 2:10: “For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” So our new selves are GOD’S work, not ours, but the purpose for which He has recreated us is to do good works. Good works are not what saves us (only Jesus is truly good), but good works are the purpose for which God saves us. What are those good works? 1) Love God and 2) Love your neighbour. (WK referenced this in his post.) Loving God is something we can only do if we acknowledge God’s existence and once we are redeemed by God (i.e. have accepted the gift) and have His Holy Spirit in us, changing our desires and motivations. Loving our neighbour is also something we can do only to a limited extent before we are redeemed. This is because we need to have Christ-centred motives in our intentions towards that person in order to truly love them as we should. We can only have Christ-centred motives once we have been saved by Christ.

So what does this mean when we hear good, solid advice from respectable, decent non-christians. Firstly, we acknowledge that non-christians can indeed be correct about the right behaviour. What they can’t be correct about are the central correct motivations for that behaviour. They can’t be Christ-centred in their motivations. And there are also necessarily aspects of behaviour which are fundamentally affected by being Christ-centred.

Let’s take the example of marriage, seeing as that was raised. A non-christian can give good advice on marriage and how to build a better marriage. They can teach love, respect, fidelity, unselfishness, responsibility, etc. These are all good things. However, they won’t teach a Christ-centred marriage. They won’t teach that marriage is meant to be a picture of Christ’s relationship with the Church. They won’t teach how the husband is supposed to model Christ in serving his wife as her leader. They won’t teach how the wife is supposed to model the Church as it should be in submitting to her husband’s leadership. The won’t teach how marriage is a picture of the Gospel, of God’s unconditional love for us and our response to Him. This means that even though non-christians may give excellent advice, their advice is inherently lacking because it is not Christ-centred.

Commentary

An analysis of the prosperity gospel by the Mysterious M

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Is this the Mysterious M?
Is this the Mysterious M?

Wow, super good post on the prosperity gospel by the “Mysterious M” at Alisha’s blog.

The start:

This is how the Lausanne Theology Working Group, Africa chapter, defined the prosperity gospel at its consultations in Akropong, Ghana:

“We define prosperity gospel as the teaching that believers have a right to the blessings of health and wealth and that they can obtain these blessings through positive confessions of faith and the “sowing of seeds” through the faithful payments of tithes and offerings.” (http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2009/decemberweb-only/gc-prosperitystatement.html)

So where does the prosperity gospel come from? And, more importantly, is it true?

For starters, there’s a good bit of wishful thinking behind it. After all, who doesn’t want to be healthy and wealthy? It’s easy to see why this theology is popular. And if you’re poor or in a state of chronic ill health it must appear particularly appealing. But wishful thinking is no basis for truth.

And a great excerpt:

The prosperity gospel undermines the witness of the Church in a world which is already cynical with regard to Christianity. Non-christians see the hypocrisy of teachers who teach it and the gullibility of those who follow them. This further confirms their bias against the true gospel and makes them dismissive of the real thing before they’ve heard it.

Moreover, a fixation on material prosperity as the measure of their faith makes Christians weak when hardship strikes because their unrealistic, unbiblical expectations are not met and they feel let down. Worse still, their appreciation of the core blessings of Christianity (eternity in the presence of God, salvation from sin and judgment, complete renewal, etc.) is dulled by finding their primary joy in peripheral blessing. Most seriously, the teaching of blessing in exchange for sowing a “seed” or some other work undermines the fundamental teaching of grace: the unmerited favour of God towards sinful man.

Is about two pages long printed out, and it’s all muscle, the whole way through! I really like this person’s writing. I actually learned things, but without having to dig through anything that I didn’t like. I love it when women write in a polemical tone – it’s mean like I want to be, but it’s not too mean so that the person she is trying to persuade won’t read the whole thing.

OK, so here’s my take on the piece. Towards the end, she started to talk about how the message of getting prosperity in this life really undermined the point of the gospel, which is about the message of a free gift of forgiveness, reconciliation and relationship to rebels against God, a relationship that goes on after we die. And I started to think about how lately I have been leaving e-mails unopened, and losing my temper, and not helping other Christians with their software projects, and so on – all because I just can’t break away from the need for some selfish time. That’s a sin. It’s failing to do everything I could do.

So I am so glad that when my selfishness stops me from doing everything I could do, that I still have the forgiveness of Jesus to take away those failures to be perfect, and I can start every day brand new, ready to ride into battle to serve the Lord. I want to serve. I’m not always perfect. But because of Jesus, it is OK to fail, and to pick yourself up and try again. I think that earning money is good – and I love saving money, too – but beyond prosperity, I think that every man wants to be a noble knight most of all. And because of Jesus, I can be, even if I fail to be noble all the time, like I should be. No weakness or moral failure in me today takes away God’s willingness to let me ride out in his colors tomorrow. And that has value.

Hmmmn. I wonder if Mysterious M would write anything for us here at the Wintery Knight? But there doesn’t seem to be any way of contacting her. Boo! She’s so… mysterious! But any woman who defends the gospel must be a knight. It’s the law!

Commentary

My friend loves his wife because she defends traditional marriage

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Actually that’s just one of the reasons… you should hear this guy go on about how his wife encouraged him to learn apologetics during the run-up to their marriage.

Here’s an essay she wrote to a pro-SSM friend:

Marriage is the union of a man and a woman who are not already married. No one has the unrestricted right to marry whoever they want, male or female, nor should they. Otherwise where does it stop? Should there be group marriage? Marriage to or between underage children? Marriage with animals? Forced marriage? Well, some of those things already happen in other countries and cultures, and I would say they’re all a net negative on society.

I truly feel for anyone who has a desire for any such relationship, whether it’s that they were born that way or because of some type of past abuse, but that doesn’t mean society has to endorse it and call it marriage. Tolerance is not good enough for gay rights advocates – it’s all out approval or nothing. And don’t say the slippery slope argument is baloney, because it’s not.

What is the purpose of marriage? To provide the best environment for raising children and protection of women and stability of society. Study after study shows that children do best when raised in the home of their mother and father. It’s only recently that marriage was pursued by people because they were in love. Marriage has been in trouble lately in the US, and it’s no surprise that children are turning to gangs, drugs, crime, promiscuity and so on in the search for love and family. I’ve seen this over and over among my own relatives and friends. If you haven’t seen it, you’re pretty blessed, and rare.

I doubt you’re interested in my point of view or will even read this, but here’s a pretty good analysis of the issue:

Based on evidence, gay marriage would not improve society.

I don’t hate gay people (it’s ridiculous that I should even have to say this, but I do feel the need). As above, I even think it’s better for a child to be adopted by a gay person/couple rather than stay in foster care. I have gay friends, family members, blah blah blah insert disclaimer here. I’m just not afraid to say that some things are better for society, and this is the case here.

I think most Americans are like me in that we believe gay people should be treated with kindness, but that the term “gay marriage” is an oxymoron. Even in California, gay marriage was very recently rejected when put to a vote by the people, in spite of a huge campaign on behalf of it.

Don’t worry, I’m surrounded by your point of view all the time, so I’ve already heard all the arguments. ;) And the fact that many fail at heterosexual marriage is not an argument for gay marriage, it’s an argument to reform heterosexual marriage in the eyes of the law and of society. ;) No fault divorce has been terrible for society, including my own immediate family. Some states now have what they call “covenant marriage” which is much stricter in letting people get married and the circumstances under which they can divorce. If that had been available to me, I would have done that.

Ah, she is marvelous. No wonder he loves her – who wouldn’t? When I read a woman writing about marriage, men and children like that, I can believe that lots of women do understand marriage, and that they really do care about their husbands and their children. She must be such a trustworthy and effective Christian mother – her kids are lucky that she can be so persuasive.

The main thing that I like is that she doesn’t think that marriage is some arrangement that is for people who are “in love”. It not about the feelings of the adults at all. There is a specific purpose for marriage, and that purpose is a social purpose. It’s not about individuals getting validation based on the sincerity of their feelings, it’s about bonding two people together who are going to stay together so that they can raise the next generation. It’s a commitment and it’s hard!

Women – if you want to make a man like you, try writing an essay like that to an opponent of your Christian or conservative or traditional views, and then CC your husband/suitor, and add a message saying you look forward to learning more about these issues together with him. Reading essays like this and see how proud her husband is of her makes me think well of marriage. It IS fun to be married and to talk about things like this.